LOS ANGELES — LOS ANGELES (AP) — President Joe Biden recently traveled to North Carolina to promote his goal of affordable internet access for all Americans, but the promise for 23 million U.S. families is on shaky ground.
That’s because a subsidy that helps people with limited resources afford internet access is set to expire this spring.
The Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), which provides $30 per month to eligible families in most places and $75 to tribal lands, will run out of money by the end of April if Congress does not extend it further.
“I think this should be a high priority for Congress,” North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat who has worked with a bipartisan group of governors to promote the program, said in a telephone interview. “For many families, $30 a month is a big deal.”
It’s a big deal for Shirleen Alexander of Charlotte, who said the money she saves through the ACP goes toward her grocery bills. It also offsets some of the stress she feels about medical bills.
“If they took (ACP) away, it would be like taking food out of my mouth,” said Alexander, a senior citizen on a fixed income. “I need the service, and some of my elderly friends need it too.”
The program is key to the Biden administration’s plans to make the internet available to all, something the president has repeatedly touted as he has ramped up his re-election campaign. He has compared it to the Rural Electrification Administration, the New Deal program that brought electricity to much of rural America in the 1930s.
“Our goal is to connect everyone in America to affordable, reliable high-speed internet by the year 2030, just as Franklin Roosevelt did with electricity a generation ago,” President Biden said in Raleigh last month.
To date, only 43% of eligible households nationwide have applied for the ACS subsidy. But the program has allowed people who signed up to avoid the kind of financial tradeoffs Alexander described, said Brian Vo, chief investment officer of Connect Humanity, a nonprofit that promotes widespread internet access. It also gives them access to essential services such as telehealth, distance learning and employment, he said.
“If you put the ACP countries and affordability in the context of the social determinants they drive and the economic value created, the benefits far outweigh the costs of $30 per household,” Vo said.
When the program ends, participating families, including nearly 900,000 in North Carolina, will lose internet access or have to pay more to stay connected.
North Carolina ranks among the top states in the country when it comes to benefiting from the ACS, according to an AP analysis of the program. More than 50% of eligible households in the state participate in the program.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers recently introduced a bill to support the ACP with an additional $7 billion in funding through the end of 2024 — a billion more than what Biden asked Congress to set aside for the program late last year. However, no votes are scheduled to advance the bill and it is unclear whether the program will be prioritized in a divided Congress.
In the meantime, the Federal Communications Commission has already taken steps to phase out the program. It has ordered internet service providers to send notices about the expected end of the program and announced that it will stop accepting new enrollees after February 7.
Nate Denny, deputy director for broadband for North Carolina, said he is “extremely concerned” about the phasing out of the subsidy program, especially since the state will receive a total of $1.5 billion from the federal government. Most of that money will be awarded to internet service providers to build internet infrastructure in areas that need it most.
“The ACS has a huge impact on adoption, but it also has a huge impact on the state’s ability to expand available infrastructure funding,” Denny said.
The ACS reduces the amount of subsidies an internet provider must build into lower-income communities because it provides the assurance of a stable customer base, according to broadband leaders of the states the AP spoke to and an analysis by the nonprofit Common Sense Media and consulting firm Boston Consulting Group.
“With the help of the ACS, Internet providers see more willing subscribers, more beneficiaries of their investments, who then help them further expand their capital, and thus also expand state investments,” Denny said.
The infrastructure money comes from a $42.5 billion pot allocated to the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program, the cornerstone of the Biden administration’s efforts to close the digital divide for good.
In December, states submitted draft plans detailing the lower-cost plans that providers that build networks using BEAD money must offer eligible families. Several states have incorporated the ACP subsidies into these draft plans in ways that would reduce the cost of Internet access to zero for some customers.
While these lower-cost plans wouldn’t work as intended without support from the federal grant program, a spokesperson for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration said BEAD “will still connect everyone in America and ensure newly connected households have access to affordable plan. ”
Several Biden administration officials, including Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, have emphasized the need for more funding for the program during trips around the country in recent months.
The state of North Carolina will do what it can to maintain affordable internet no matter what, the governor said, but he hopes Congress will ensure the subsidies go to those who need them.
“We want to try to keep this program alive, and I still think there’s still an opportunity to do that,” Cooper said.
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Harjai is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.