23. June 2021

This article has been indexed from Deeplinks

A month ago, Governor Newsom announced a plan to invest $7 billion of federal rescue funds and state surplus dollars to be mostly invested into public broadband infrastructure meant to serve every Californian with affordable access to infrastructure ready for 21st century demands. In short, the proposal would empower the state government, local governments, cooperatives, non-profits, and local private entities to utilize the dollars to build universal 21st century access. With that level of money, the state could end the digital divide—if invested correctly.

But, so far, industry opposition from AT&T and cable have successfully sidelined the money—as EFF warned earlier this month. Now, they’re attempting to reshape how the state spends a once-in-a-generation investment of funds to eliminate the digital divide into wasteful spending and a massive subsidy that would go into the industry’s hands. Before we break down the woefully insufficient industry alternative proposals that are circulating in Sacramento, it is important we understand the nature of California’s broadband problem today, and why Governor Newsom’s proposal is a direct means of solving it.

Industry’s Already Shown Us How Profit-Driven Deployment Leaves People Behind

This cannot be emphasized enough, but major industry players are discriminating against communities that would be

profitable

to fully serve in the long term. Why? These huge companies have opted to expand their short-term profits through discriminatory choices against the poor. That’s how California became the setting for a stark illustration of the digital divide in the pandemic: a picture of little girls doing homework in a fast food parking lot so they could access the internet. That was not in a rural market, where households are more spaced out. That was Salinas, California, a city with a population of 155,000+ people at a density of 6,490 people per square mile. There was no good

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Read the original article: How Big ISPs Are Trying to Burn California’s $7 Billion Broadband Fund

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