Podcasts
The Director of Broadband Development for Kansas joined the latest episode of the Beyond the Cable podcast to discuss remaining challenges when it comes to conquering Kansas’s digital divide.
By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities
Jade Piros de Carvalho, the director of the Kansas Office of Broadband Development, said it will be a “horrible failure” if funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) is not renewed and expressed concern that the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program will be less successful without the ACP.
The program, which runs out of funding at the end of April, currently provides a discount of up to $30 per month toward internet service for eligible households and up to $75 per month for households on qualifying Tribal lands, according to the FCC.
“It’s huge. It’s 23 million Americans,” Piros de Carvalho said, during her recent appearance on Beyond the Cable, a podcast produced by bbcmag.com. “It’s very disappointing. I have not seen a program that is so broadly appreciated and supported by such a wide swath of America.”
She said her office has been very vocal in advocacy efforts to maintain the program and has interacted with the Congressional delegation representing Kansas to advocate for renewed ACP funding.
“We’ve really been as vocal as we can in trying to get our lawmakers to stand up and do something about it,” Piros de Carvalho said.
Piros de Carvalho said she remains hopeful that, if the program lapses, public outcry will force something else to be done.
“I have huge reservations that BEAD (Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment) will be as successful as it could be without ACP,” she said. “It’s not just that less people will be on the network, it’s that there is so much uncertainty around even building networks in areas that might be economically distressed.”
