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| Summer 2020 Newsletter |
August 27, 2020 |
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Welcome to the third quarter newsletter! Students in Colorado are already preparing for the upcoming school year, which will be drastically different than previous years. The Colorado Broadband Office (CBO) has been working diligently with our state and federal partner agencies, as well as Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to enable students to learn from home, a major concern for families across the state. Stay up-to-date by visiting our Connecting Colorado Students webpage and following us on Twitter.
In June, the Department of Regulatory Affairs (DORA) published the Broadband Deployment Board 2019 in Review. The Broadband Fund awarded 16 grants totaling $11 million across two grant cycles. The Board received 16 applications in the Summer 2020 grant cycle for a total of $16 million. You can review and provide feedback on these applications by September 13, 2020.
The CBO continues to support stakeholder engagement in various federal broadband funding programs. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will commit up to $600 million in Round 2 ReConnect funding. Three Colorado broadband providers submitted applications in this program and are awaiting notification from the USDA. CARES Act appropriations to the U.S. Department of Education and the FCC exceeded $30 billion. Colorado school districts benefited by $164 million, some of which may be used to provide broadband connectivity to teachers and students to support remote learning. Twelve Colorado healthcare providers received awards from the FCC COVID-19 Telehealth Program totaling over $3.9 million to provide connected care services to patients at their homes or mobile locations in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, the FCC will auction $16 billion in rural broadband infrastructure funds beginning on October 29. Be sure to check out The Federal Corner for more federal broadband funding insights.
We are excited to start sharing some of the outcomes from the Broadband Stories survey we launched in March. If you have not had a chance to take the survey, there is still time! Please scroll down or visit our website to see an analysis of the data received from the survey. Stay tuned for more insights as we continue to explore stakeholder broadband experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is moving quickly with the $16 billion Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF). The RDOF Phase I auction (Auction 904) will begin October 29, 2020. On June 11, 2020, the FCC adopted procedures for the auction and the short-form application window closed on July 15, 2020. Entities planning to participate in the auction were required to file the short-form application. A list of all applicants that filed a short form will be posted here; however, the publicly available applications will not indicate where applicants intend to bid. Keep up-to-date with RDOF information pertinent to Colorado by visiting the RDOF page on our website.
The USDA has begun awarding funding in Round 2 of the ReConnect Program. To date they have awarded $75 million to six applicants for fiber-to-the-home in Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, Maryland, and Oklahoma. Three Colorado broadband providers applied for $25.1 million in USDA ReConnect Round 2 100% Grant funds. With matching funds from the providers, this totals a potential $33.5 million investment for Colorado, to provide fiber-to-the-home to over 3,112 locations in western Colorado.
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The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act supplied billions of dollars in funding for a number of programs that support broadband connections. For Colorado, this included $164 million from the Education Stabilization Fund, awards to twelve Colorado healthcare providers totaling $3.9 million from the FCC’s COVID-19 Telehealth Program, and $10,000 to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe from the CARES Act Grants for Museums and Libraries. Visit our COVID-19 Broadband Resources webpage for up-to-date information on relief funding.
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The Broadband Mapping team has been very busy this quarter. At the end of June, we relaunched the Colorado Broadband Map using a simpler interface with a more reliable search tool. The old “Broadband Board Toolkit” was replaced with the new Colorado Broadband Board Toolkit Map, which caters to the needs of the Broadband Deployment Board and to Broadband Fund applicants.
Our fall data collection cycle is happening right now and the data submission deadline is Friday, September 11, 2020. Colorado broadband providers should have received communication from our mapping team asking for updated data. If you or your company contact have not heard from us, we may need updated contact information. Please let us know by emailing oit_broadband@state.co.us. Updated data will be published to the Broadband Map by Friday, October 9, 2020.
Lastly, we are happy to announce that Colorado has joined the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) National Broadband Availability Map (NBAM), a geographic information system platform that allows for the visualization and analysis of federal, state, and commercially available data sets. By joining this effort, the CBO will have access to invaluable data and visualization tools while helping create a national platform that can help inform policymakers and expand internet coverage across the United States. If you have questions about this project, please email us at oit_broadband@state.co.us.
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In May, we started the Broadband Stories survey to find out about Coloradans’ experience using the internet during the pandemic. We knew that reliance on broadband had become even more central to daily life, as many Coloradans shifted to working, learning, and accessing critical services from home. To date we have received over 500 responses. The results so far show that only 18% of the respondents describe their internet service as “Great, meets my needs” and 95% of respondents’ homes have at least one person working or learning from home, with many homes having multiple adults and children using the internet at the same time.
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Please visit our website for an in-depth review of the survey results. We have made a few updates to the survey and encourage you to take the survey again so that we can understand how your experience has evolved over time. We will continue to collect your stories throughout the year in order to understand internet needs, usage, and experiences across the state. |
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