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When state legislative Republicans pressed the pause button on state taxpayer funding for broadband expansion, they offered an opportunity to reflect on intertwining questions.
When and why did bringing internet access to every home and business in Wisconsin become the sole province of government, rather than the marketing mission of established private internet providers? And is there a case to be made that the cost of the mission is worth the economic, educational and societal goals?
Even a cursory look will tell you the decisive tipping point from private to public was the federal funding hurricane of so-called COVID-19 emergency spending bills. The CARES Act and the American Rescue Plan Act have pumped $175 million into the state’s broadband program over the past three years. In the four previous years from 2014-17 the total was less than $4 million, according to data collected by the Public Service Commission.
And even without the $750 million Republicans lifted from Gov. Evers’ proposed budget, on Monday, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced that Wisconsin will get $1.055 billion from the $42.45 billion earmarked in for rural broadband expansion in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
Only 13 other states got bigger broadband grants. Only Michigan with $1.56 billion got a larger grant among the states adjacent to Wisconsin. Illinois got $1 billion; Minnesota, $652 million; and Iowa, $415 million.
For the past three years and for probably at least the next three, internet companies have been and will be chasing huge sums of federal dollars rather than investing their own.
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