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Part IV: Broadband by Committee

Nov 24, 2021
Key Points
  • Hundreds of thousands of families and businesses across the state lack reliable modern-day internet to tackle their jobs and attend school.
  • Around $700 million could help bridge the digital divide between Georgia’s urban and rural counties.
  • Costs of building broadband – at several thousand dollars per location – highlights the need for local governments to keep providers from duplicating service or cherry-picking easier-to-reach areas.
A committee of state lawmakers and agency heads is now weeding through 169 applications from city and county governments, electrical co-ops and nonprofits vying for a slice of the $300 million in federal ARPA funds. They’re using a scorecard to rank applicants based on how many people a broadband project will cover and whether they ...