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Nebraska State Broadband Office

Nebraska State Broadband Office Overview

Nebraska Broadband Grant Award Status

BEAD: $405.3 M

Nebraska 5 Year Plan
Initial Proposal v1
Challenge Window
4
Initial Proposal v2
5
Application Window
6
Awards Announced

Treasury Capital Projects Fund: $128.7 M

Treasury Approved
Application Window
3
Awards Announced

Parent Department:
Nebraska Information Technology Commission

Nebraska Broadband Director

Patrick Haggerty

State Broadband Director

About Nebraska Broadband Office

Republican Governor Pete Ricketts signed legislative bill 388 into law in May 2021. The legislation, dubbed the Broadband Bridge Act Grant Program, provides $20 million in matching grants annually to expand broadband access for unserved and underserved areas.

The legislation defines "unserved" as areas that don't have access to 25 x3 Mbps broadband networks, and "underserved" as those without access to 100x20 Mbps networks.

The legislation is expected to bring reliable broadband connections to an estimated 30,000 households.

The Nebraska Public Service Commission is the state’s point of contact for broadband related activities.

In August, the Nebraska Regional Officials Council unveiled a new broadband map in the hope of better pinpointing where the state’s populace most direly needed resources along with identifying how these new funds could best be used to help the state’s commerce and education sectors.

Information about the state's Rural Broadband Taskforce is available here. Its 2021 October report on the state of broadband in Nebraska is available here.

The state will receive a minimum of $300,000 to develop state digital equity plans. The program is scheduled to begin Oct. 1, 2022. States have one year to complete these plans.

The Network Nebraska program is a resource sharing telecommunications network under the Nebraska Information Technology Commission (NITC) that works together to provide reliable, and affordable infrastructure.

The state distributes funds from the $20 million pot from the general fund as grants. These grants fund the deployment of broadband networks in unserved and underserved areas of the state.

In 2020, Ricketts dedicated $29 million of the federal CARES Act funds to broadband deployment.

The Nebraska Universal Service Fund — which comes from fees levied on cellphone and landline phone bills — spent $106.5 million on high-speed internet expansion since 2016.

That's on top of money from the federal Universal Service Fund. Nebraska also received $60 million in the past couple of years through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, $124 million via the Alternative Connect America Cost Model and $9 million from the USDA's ReConnect Program.

More info

Other contacts:

  • Charlotte Narjes, Extension Educator University of Nebraska - Lincoln cnarjes1@unl.edu (402) 472-1724
  • Cullen Robbins, Director of Communications, Nebraska Public Service Commission cullen.robbins@nebraska.gov (402) 471-3101
  • Tom Rolfes NTIA Federal Program Officer trolfes@ntia.gov (202) 595-4548

Nebraska Broadband Articles

Nebraska Broadband Investment Maps

Nebraska broadband investment map ready strength rank

Nebraska Map of Ready Strength Rank

Nebraska broadband investment map yield on cost

Nebraska Yield on Cost Maps

Nebraska broadband investment pricing and competition map

Nebraska Pricing & Competition Map

Nebraska broadband investment map business establishments

Nebraska Map of Business Establishments in Underserved Areas

Nebraska broadband investment map REC coverage

Nebraska Rural Electric Cooperative (REC) Coverage Map

Nebraska broadband investment map anchor institutions

Nebraska Map of Anchor Institutions

Nebraska broadband investment map provider coverage

Nebraska Provider Coverage Maps

Nebraska broadband investment map BSLs

Map of Nebraska Broadband Serviceable Locations