$416M heading to Nevada for internet improvements

Nevada will receive $416 million to expand access to high-speed internet, federal officials announced Monday.

The White House announced its allocations of $42.5 billion to all 50 states and U.S. territories as part of the “Internet for All” initiative, a component of the Biden Administration’s “Investing in America” agenda.

President Joe Biden on Monday pledged that every household in the nation would have internet access by 2030 using cables made in the United States.

“High-speed internet isn’t a luxury anymore,” he said. “It’s become an absolute necessity.”

The funding, which Biden called the “biggest investment in high-speed internet ever,” comes from the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act’s Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment Program.

Nevada will receive its formal notice of allocation June 30, and the state will have 180 days from the date of that formal notice to submit its initial proposals that describe how they propose to run their grant programs, according to a news release from the “Internet for All” initiative.

The internet access funding amounts depended primarily on the number of unserved locations in each jurisdiction or those locations that lack access to internet download speeds of at least 25 megabits per second download and upload speeds of 3 Mbps.

The funding includes more than $1 billion each for 19 states, with remaining states falling below that threshold. Allotments range from $100.7 million for Washington, D.C., to $3.3 billion for Texas.

Last month, Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., pushed the Federal Communications Commission to update its national broadband map because it did not accurately reflect Nevada’s high-speed internet coverage, which could affect the amount of funding it receives, according to a Monday statement from Rosen’s office.

The new version of the map identified about 27,000 new broadband serviceable locations, as well as 7,000 new locations that do not have access to high-speed service. About 984,000 locations in total could be eligible for funding, and about 44,500 locations do not have access to high-speed service at all and also are eligible to get the federal grants, according to Rosen’s office.

“Internet connectivity is essential for Nevadans’ daily lives, and I’ve made it one of my top priorities to ensure every household in our state has access to high-speed internet,” Rosen said in the statement. “As a result of these successful efforts, I have secured $416 million to connect more Nevadans across our state to high-speed internet.”

Contact Jessica Hill at jehill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @jess_hillyeah on Twitter. The Associated Press contributed to this report.