County officials from across the state gathered in Lexington for the Kentucky County Judge-Executive Association’s winter conference. Among Wednesday’s speakers was Ben U’Sellis with Charter Communications, which owns Spectrum. He discussed the many steps needed to bring broadband Internet to new areas as part of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment, or BEAD program.
“Before all this started, we might send a poll owner, a utility company, a few 100 permits a year for new polls that we needed to attach to now we're sending them 1000s and 1000s a month, so that just kind of shows you the scale.”
The Bead program was part of President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and provides more than $42 billion to expand high-speed Internet access.
“This is the $1.1 billion of funding that is being dedicated to effectively covering the remaining homes eligible in Kentucky that are in need of service.”
U’Sellis showed a state map showing more than 111,000 locations identified as needing high-speed Internet. He said county officials should stay up to date with BEAD developments and gather community support for broadband expansion.
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