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RUS to Announce $310M in Broadband Stimulus Funds Today or Tomorrow

By Paula Bernier, Executive Editor, IP Communications Magazines

The Agriculture Department's Rural Utilities Service later today or tomorrow expects to announce another $310 million in first-round broadband stimulus awards, USDA spokesman Bartel Kendrick confirmed with TMCnet today.

 

This group of awards is just part of the money to be dispersed by RUS this round. Additional announcements will be made on a rolling weekly basis going forward, Kendrick added.

 

According to reports, these first-round broadband stimulus funds, which will bring high-speed Internet connections to 14 rural communities around the country, have been allocated as such:

• $88.1 million in grant and loan monies will go to an Alaskan telecommunications company that will build 'middle mile' networks to connect 65 towns and villages in southwestern Alaska to the Internet;

• $19.1 million in grant and loan funds will go to a Missouri electric cooperative to build a fiber-optic network that will reach nearly 5,000 homes, businesses, public safety entities and community organizations in rural Ralls County, Mo.;

• a $3.9 million grant will go to a unit of TDS Telecommunications Corp. to build a DSL network to serve residential, business and community-related organizations in sparsely populated parts of Alabama;

• a $376,000 grant and loan will go to an as-yet-specified telephone company to build a WiMAX (News - Alert) network to service 325 homes in northeast Iowa.

Edited by Stefania Viscusi