From the Arkansas Advocate:
Arkansas’ final proposal for a federal broadband program has received approval from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), according to a Tuesday press release for the state’s commerce department.
As part of the Broadband, Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program, Arkansas has been allocated $1.024 billion in funding to deliver broadband access to more than 79,000 homes and businesses across the state, according to the release. The Arkansas State Broadband Office (ARConnect) is responsible for administering the BEAD program and funding process at the state level.
“Arkansas is proud to continue serving as one of the states leading this program nationally and be in the first wave of approvals for provisional grant selections,” State Broadband Director Glen Howie said. “This approval gets us one step closer to putting shovels in the ground to connect Arkansans who remain unconnected.”
Eighteen states and U.S. territories received approval this week for their final proposals, which are expected to save taxpayers approximately $6 billion, according to the release.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will now review Arkansas’ BEAD program budget. Pending NIST review and subsequent appropriation approval by the Arkansas General Assembly, ARConnect anticipates construction on these projects to begin during the second quarter of 2026, according to the release.
“After stripping away burdensome rules and regulations and wasteful requirements, taxpayers will save billions in unnecessary costs while connecting those in need to high-speed broadband through the full spectrum of broadband technologies,” U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said.
The BEAD program, a $42.45 billion initiative created under the Biden administration’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, aims to close the digital divide by expanding broadband access, particularly in rural communities.
However, the Trump administration made changes to the program that disqualified hundreds of thousands of locations from receiving internet access, according to Stateline. The program’s new technology-neutral approach will also shift a large portion of the funding toward satellite internet companies, which cost less to build, but have more uneven service than underground fiber optic cable.
Participation in the BEAD program is one of the latest efforts to expand broadband access in Arkansas, especially in rural areas. In 2019, former Gov. Asa Hutchinson created the state’s broadband office, which is “tasked with eliminating the digital divide within the state by 2028,” according to its website.
Although millions of dollars have been poured into the goal, some lawmakers like Rep. Frances Cavenaugh, R-Walnut Ridge, are not pleased with the results. During the Arkansas Legislative Council’s Review subcommittee meeting last Tuesday, Cavenaugh, the committee’s co-chair, questioned a request to amend an existing contract with the Boston Consulting Group to execute the BEAD Program and support ARConnect. Extending the contract term from 2026 to 2029 would add $29.7 million to the contract, which would be completely covered by federal funds, according to documents provided to the committee.
Cavenaugh expressed frustration that she has repeatedly asked, but not received a straight answer about how much of Arkansas is covered by broadband because the state has “been throwing money at this now forever.” The Northeast Arkansas Republican said parts of her district are still not covered by broadband.
To date, the state has spent more than $500 million on broadband, not counting the BEAD program, Howie said. More than 79,000 locations are expected to be covered under the BEAD program. The question of how much of the state is covered by broadband is nuanced, Howie said, because more than 200,000 locations have been awarded a grant that’s not administered by his team and therefore they don’t have insight into the exact progress of those projects.
Additionally, Cavenaugh said she’s heard reports of issues with providers that have led to broadband projects stalling. She asked Howie for more clarity about how the state is dealing with providers who aren’t fulfilling their contracts and what it will cost to fix this problem.
“There’s a lot of issues going on in the broadband, and we’re not getting the full picture of what’s happening with that,” Cavenaugh said. “So I guess I’m asking for transparency because there is none, and we’re spending $30 million with someone to help us with that. It’s mindboggling.”
The subcommittee approved Cavenaugh’s motion to hold the broadband contract so she could receive additional information about her questions. Her co-chair, Corning Republican Sen. Blake Johnson, announced the hold was released during Friday’s Arkansas Legislative Council meeting, and lawmakers approved the contract.
