Need for better broadband in rural Minnesota outstrips resources available to provide it

Casey Jelinski was sure it would be easy to run a graphic design company from her new home when she moved with her family to Aitkin County from the Twin Cities area a decade ago. But internet speeds were shockingly slow. Sometimes it took hours to upload files to clients in China and Europe. She’d occasionally drive more than 60 miles to Duluth and check in at a hotel to work.“It never dawned on me that it would be such a detriment to my business,” Jelinski said of inadequate broadband access. “There’s no reason for it.”A recent switch to a DSL connection helped, but Jelinski worried about her business’ future. The family moved to De Pere, Wis., last week — after Jelinski confirmed that it has great broadband access.In Aitkin County — which at 27 percent has the least broadband coverage in Minnesota — and across the U.S., reliable, speedy internet is increasingly essential for work, health care, education and social connections. But as President Donald Trump’s administration looks to clamp down on federal spending, there’s deepening uncertainty about the flow of federal dollars necessary to bring faster internet to lower-population areas.“The outlook [for rural broadband improvements] is not positive” under Trump, said Milda Hedblom, a lawyer, broadband advocate and digital studies professor at Augsburg College in Minneapolis.About 22 percent of households in rural Minnesota — 202,000 homes — lack access to fixed, nonmobile broadband service at download speeds of at least 25 megabits per second and upload speeds of 3 mbps, according to the state Department of Employment and Economic Development. Minnesota is ahead of the national average: 39 percent of rural residents have no access to those speeds, according to the Federal Communications Commission.