Broadband Deployment and Promotion
The Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the Agriculture Department’s Rural Utilities Service (RUS) are making available more than $7 billion in stimulus funding to promote the deployment of broadband services in rural and underserved areas. State and local governments, as well as for-profit corporations and non-profit organizations, are among the entities that are eligible to apply.
The agencies have said they expect to conduct two more competitions for the funding (the deadline for the first is August 14, 2009) and that the criteria may change in the future. They are required to allocate all of the funding by September 2010.