(CN) — Tackling the state’s glaring digital divide, California Governor Gavin Newsom on Tuesday inked plans for a $6 billion overhaul of the state’s outdated broadband internet infrastructure.
From an elementary school in one of California’s prime farming regions, Newsom lamented the state’s past failures to improve internet access and said the funding is intended to give children an equal chance to flourish in the digital age.
“We’ve been talking about the lack of broadband access for the greater part of our lives and yet you just sit there and wonder ‘What the hell is wrong with us?’” Newsom said during a signing ceremony in Tulare County. “You’re not inherently born a coder because you grew up in Silicon Valley versus the Central Valley; it’s about opportunity.”
California Democrats — who claim supermajorities in both chambers and each of the state constitutional officers — and Republicans rarely agree on high-ticket items, but in this case they’ve decided better internet access is critical to fighting the state’s growing income inequality.
Lawmakers announced the landmark deal last week and Senate Bill 156 was cleared unanimously three days later despite opposition from the telecommunications industry, which repeated its familiar warning that government intervention could stifle innovation and competition.
While similar broadband funding proposals have stalled in recent years, the industry’s concerns were drowned out thanks in part to an incident outside a Taco Bell restaurant in Salinas, Calif.
In what has become an iconic photo, a photojournalist captured two elementary students on the ground huddled over laptops doing homework as two masked employees looked on. The jarring photo of the children using the fast food restaurant’s free WiFi went viral and has been credited with spurring lawmakers into action.
State Senator Lena Gonzalez said the funding stands to benefit both rural and urban students, noting that thousands of students in her Southern California district were plagued by insufficient internet speeds during the previous school year.
“Today is our time to turn the corner,” said Gonzalez, D-Long Beach. “Every single part of the state will be touched with these dollars.”
With Tuesday’s signing, the funding for the broadband expansion is officially welded into the $262 billion 2021-2022 budget that has been pieced together in dozens of separate bills in recent weeks.
The main portion, $3.25 billion, will be used to contract with a private entity to build the bulk of the broadband fiber network, with another $2 billion to finish the “last-mile” and connect homes and businesses to the new main line. The package also includes $750 million to assist municipalities and non-profits with financing local broadband improvements.
The $6 billion will be divvied out over the next three years, with over half coming from California’s share of the federal 2021 American Rescue Plan Act. Under the landmark plan, underserved communities will be prioritized, specifically areas where internet download speeds over 25 megabits per second aren’t currently available.
Newsom congratulated state lawmakers for fending off the industry’s lobbyists in bipartisan fashion and acknowledged Congress for passing the overarching pandemic relief.
“For those elected officials that supported the federal appropriation, thank you,” Newsom said.
To ensure transparency over the massive grants, Newsom and lawmakers have tasked the California Public Utilities Commission with identifying underserved regions and greenlighting priority projects. The bill also creates a “broadband czar” to be appointed by the governor along with a nine-member advisory committee.
Nonprofits and digital rights groups roundly applauded the broadband framework.
“The pandemic proved what we have known for decades — we could no longer afford to have any Californian remain disconnected from essential services like telehealth, distance learning, job training, e-commerce, emergency response and countless other critical resources,” said Arnold Sowell Jr., executive director of NextGen Policy.
San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation encouraged local leaders to take advantage of the grants and control their “own destiny.”
“No longer will the state of California simply defer to the whims of AT&T and cable for broadband access, now every community is being given their shot to choose their broadband destiny,” it said in a press release.
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