Major broadband funding to benefit rural Virginia

RICHMOND, Va. (WDBJ) – July has been a big month for the effort to deliver universal broadband in Virginia.

Recent announcements from the state and federal governments promise major funding to complete the job.

Last week, the state awarded more than $40 million from the Virginia Telecommunications Initiative for 10 different projects serving 20 localities.

And the Biden administration approved Virginia’s initial proposal for more than $1.4 billion under the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program.

“We are getting very close,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin told WDBJ7 in an interview Monday morning.

With the latest BEAD funding, Youngkin said the goal of bringing reliable high-speed internet to all Virginians is within reach.

“This is part of ‘the Virginia way,’ which is to make sure that everybody has full access to educational opportunities, to job opportunities and of course to life,” Youngkin said. “And the internet is incredibly important.”

Several localities in western Virginia applied for the latest VATI grants. And at least three in our area, Botetourt, Franklin and Rockbridge counties, received awards.

“We’ve got a lot of hand-climb poles, a lot of rock, a lot of terrain challenges, so yes we were very, very happy,” said Rockbridge County Administrator Spencer Suter Monday afternoon.

Suter said the VATI awards were especially sweet after unsuccessful applications in 2022 and 2023.

And he said the county hopes to benefit from the BEAD funding in the future.

“I would like for folks to know that we have never quit, and we won’t quit and we’re going to keep pushing until everybody has access to quality broadband,” Suter said.

The latest round of federal funding flows from the Biden administration’s infrastructure law that passed with bipartisan support almost three years ago.

The next step is to identify all of the remaining locations that lack access and are not part of any other broadband project.

The state hopes to begin accepting applications from service providers later this year.

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