FCC set to waste billions on the wrong rural broadband providers

Rural communities have already proven that cooperatives are the way to get good, fast Internet access to underserved areas. So why are AT&T and other big corporations in line to get $2.5 billion in government funding to reach customers – again. The Connect America Fund is the Federal Communication Commission’s (FCC) effort to connect the unconnected, mostly by throwing billions of dollars to the companies that have most resisted investing in rural areas. AT&T, alone, is getting $2.5 billion over six years from this fund to invest in obsolete connections too slow to meet the FCC’s definition of broadband. Since the creation of the Connect America Fund during President Obama’s first term, its funding schemes and disbursements have disproportionately supported big monopolies over local cooperatives that offer superior services.