Indiana

The Indiana Broadband Office has announced the results of the 18th round of the Indiana Connectivity Program, awarding $133,943 to connect 28 households across 15 counties. The Indiana Connectivity Program pairs unserved and underserved locations with broadband providers and awards them grants to help offset construction costs. The providers have nine months to complete their projects. Indiana Connectivity Program awards are announced every few months, and more are expected.

TDS Telecommunications is upgrading its entire Indiana service area to bring faster, more reliable internet to more homes and businesses. Supported in part by the Federal Communications Commission’s Enhanced Alternative Connect America Model program and complemented by additional private investment from TDS, the work will expand high-speed access in rural and underserved locations while increasing available speeds in select areas throughout the state. E-ACAM provides funding support for rural high-speed connections to select locations across the U.S.

Mercury Wireless Indiana and Mercury Broadband request a limited waiver of the Federal Communications Commission’s Rural Digital Opportunity Fund’s (“RDOF”) service milestone and non-compliance rules in Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio. Consistent with Wireline Competition Bureau precedent, Mercury requests limited relief similar to that provided to other carriers that have relinquished some, but not all, of their RDOF-funded support.

Under Commerce Secretary Lutnick’s leadership, our Benefit of the Bargain reforms restored the program to its statutory objective: universal connectivity delivered through competition, accountability, and respect for the law.  The result has been lower costs for taxpayers, real skin in the game for providers, and faster broadband access for consumers. States, freed from unlawful one-size-fits-all mandates, could evaluate projects on a granular basis and select those that truly fit their needs.

Brightspeed completed its fiber network build in six Northern Indiana communities: Francesville, Knox, LaGrange, Nappanee, North Judson, and Syracuse. With this milestone, more than 13,500 families and businesses in those communities now have access to reliable, blazing-fast connectivity, empowering them to work remotely, learn online, participate in e-commerce, receive telehealth services, and thrive in today’s hyperconnected world.Construction is underway in 14 additional North Indiana communities. 

The Indiana Broadband Office announced the results of the 15th round of the Indiana Connectivity Program, awarding $654,676 to expand broadband access

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau denied Mercury Wireless Indiana, Mercury Wireless Kansas, and Mercury Broadband’s (collectively Mercury) request for waiver of the Commission’s rules, which governs the recovery of Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) support when recipients do not fulfill the program’s buildout requirements. The Bureau finds that Mercury did not demonstrate that good cause supports reducing the required support recovery for Mercury’s RDOF defaults in Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, and Ohio. Mercury originated in Kansas and

The Indiana Connectivity Program has awarded almost $1.7 million in new funding to bring connectivity to 371 addresses in the thirteenth round of funding. The total investments in the projects reached almost $7.8 million for the funding round. In all, the precise investment totals for the round and its 371 locations are $1,660,949 in state funds and $7,768,342 in total investment, according to the program.

More than a billion dollars worth of government incentives to boost rural Hoosier broadband access could get tangled in the utility pole attachment fight between Indiana’s electricity providers and telecommunications companies—prompting a major potential amendment and several hostile exchanges at a committee hearing. “For three years of my life, I have been trying to get the utilities and the telecoms to agree,” the committee’s frustrated leader, Rep Ed Soliday (R-4), began. “… And so, we now are here.” “The loser in all of this is the rural person who needs broadband,” he said.