State broadband officers are exhausted with BEAD

According to interviews and research from the Benton Institute for Broadband and Society, state broadband officers are exhausted by the challenges and shifting dynamics of implementing the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program. Leaders from the Benton Institute have interviewed over 30 SBOs so far about what it is taking to implement BEAD. And Dr. Revati Prasad of the Benton Institute talked about the takeaways from those conversations in a recent Fiber Broadband Association webinar. “The people who are in charge of overseeing this work are feeling exhausted,” said Prasad. “It's been a long haul, and more than one person said to us, ‘Just want to get it done.’ Their legislatures aren't exactly hostile to broadband; their governors aren't hostile to broadband. They're just not particularly interested in talking about it anymore.”