Jesse Andrews
Which Communities Go Dark in a Storm?
In late September 2024, Hurricane Helene made landfall on Florida’s Gulf Coast and drove more than 400 miles inland, into the southern Appalachians, mountain country that does not expect hurricanes. The storm devastated valleys and hollows. Roads were washed out, and in many places the power stayed off for weeks. In Henderson County, North Carolina, local internet provider Morris Broadband went dark. For 80 hours, or more than three days, its network was down.
Rural Nebraska Offers Insights into BEAD and Technological Neutrality
On June 6, 2025, a policy notice from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) forced state broadband offices back to the drawing board. With plans for the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program nearly final, the preference for fiber broadband—established in the program’s original Notice of Funding Opportunity—was eliminated. Under the new rules, any technology that can claim speeds of 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up is treated as equal, with project selection defaulting to the lowest‑cost bidder.
A hard look at quality and policy from the lens of the rural internet consumer
Utilizing a unique dataset of 296 mostly rural households in Nebraska, this study examines rural broadband satisfaction and the distribution of broadband types through two questions: Does reported household satisfaction with broadband connectivity differ with the access method? And how does the built environment influence the distribution of broadband technologies?