When the state announced that it's set to receive $1.3 billion of federal funds to improve broadband access, rural Texans who have been waiting years for the money were disappointed.
They were expecting three times the amount.
Two years ago, $3.3 billion was pledged for Texas through a bipartisan infrastructure deal signed by President Joe Biden to fund the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program, or BEAD. The state won federal approval for its plan to use those funds last year.
But a year later, Texas submitted a new plan and was awarded just shy of $1.3 billion from the Trump administration. Local leaders who have fought for investment in broadband and companies serving Texans in the rural counties with limited internet access feel let down.
“For the longest time, everyone has been saying it’s $3.3 billion, and there were even questions if $3.3 billion was going to be enough for Texas,” said Lonnie Hunt, the executive director of the Deep East Texas Council of Governments and Economic Development District. “It is a lot less than what we expected it to be.”
The state received more than $6.4 billion in requests for federal dollars, according to state documents.
More than 2.8 million Texas households and 7 million Texans lack broadband, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and a disproportionate number of those are in rural areas such as Deep East Texas. A low population density makes it less profitable for companies to establish broadband infrastructure, and companies that do enter rural areas charge customers higher-than-average rates for slower-than-average speeds.
Kelty Garbee, the executive director of Texas Rural Funders, a nonprofit that has pushed for better internet services in the state’s rural areas, said the allocation is “much less than expected and less than what's needed to provide rural communities with the same quality of service available in metro areas.”
The funds, according to the state’s reimagined plan as of October, will work to connect more than 123,000 locations to end-to-end fiber technology and about 65,000 others through low-earth orbit satellites. Another 54,000 locations will be connected wirelessly through radio signals.
“We are certainly disappointed in the BEAD allocation,” said Rusty Moore, general manager and chief operating officer of Big Bend Telephone, a broadband company in West Texas. “I think an incredible opportunity has been missed.”
The Texas Comptroller’s office, which has overseen the state’s broadband deployment, said in a news release Thursday that the program aims to “make it possible for almost every Texas location on the Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Map to connect to high-speed internet for the first time in state history.”
Although the allocation is less than what the state was expecting, Hunt said it’s better than nothing.
“This is just one piece of the puzzle, but it’s a really big piece,” Hunt said. “Our goal all along has been broadband for every single home and business in our region…. We definitely are one of the most underserved and underconnected areas not only in Texas but in the Country.”
Concerns about how the funds will be spent — and whether the neediest communities will get a portion — date back years ago, when Texans raised concerns about the Texas Broadband Development Maps’ accuracy.
The road to connecting the entire state to broadband connections has been full of twists and turns over the years. The original amount of federal dollars, $3.3 billion, awarded to Texas was the most of any state — despite U.S. Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, who both represent Texas, voting against the funding in Biden’s infrastructure act.
To obtain the funding, the state had to submit a plan to the federal government. The state was working on the plan for how to spend the money with the National Telecommunication and Information Administration, the federal office overseeing the BEAD program. When the plan was approved last November, after President Donald Trump won the 2024 election, Cruz wrote a letter promising to review the federal broadband program. In his letter, Cruz blamed the Biden administration for the delay and signaled that substantial changes were on the horizon for the program.
Cruz’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
In a statement to the Dallas Morning News, Cruz said his work is saving taxpayers.
“My work on the Commerce Committee to hold the BEAD program accountable has spared taxpayers from paying for internet to mansions and vacation islands while still securing over $1 billion in funding for Texas,” Cruz said in a statement. “By refocusing the program on its core mission of digital connection, instead of the Biden administration’s costly and burdensome regulation, we have freed states like Texas to responsibly use this money to expand internet access to rural communities.”
In January, former Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar wrote a letter to Cruz, who is the chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Hegar recommended changes to the requirements for BEAD funding, including opening eligibility to technology other than fiber and eliminating the low-cost requirement.
That requirement was part of the Affordable Connectivity Program, which started in 2021 and offered a discount on internet services to households that could not afford service otherwise. Congress did not continue funding for the program, bringing it to an end in 2024 with 23 million households nationwide enrolled. Hegar is now the Chancellor of the Texas A&M University System.
Garbee said with funding settled, the state faces more difficult questions now.
“Are we asking communities without broadband (and the internet service providers working with them) to do more with less?” she said. “Will this make it harder to connect every corner of Texas?”
Disclosure: Texas A&M University System has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.
