Three years after passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, implementation of the legislation’s broadband and digital equity investments is well underway. National Skills Coalition’s recent review of state progress reveals promising trends, exciting proposals, and some delays.
Both the Digital Equity Act and the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) funding are being overseen by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), which sits within the US Commerce Department.
Where does funding stand now?
- Nearly every state has now received its Digital Equity Capacity Grant (formula funding that is guaranteed to every state), but no state has yet re-granted any of those funds down to the local level. Most states will be releasing their Requests for Proposals in early 2025.
- States and other eligible entities are awaiting word on their Digital Equity Competitive Grant applications. The federal government received over 700 applications and more than $6 billion in requests for the available $1 billion in funding. Announcements of these grant awards are expected to occur on a rolling basis beginning this month.
- Every state has had its initial proposal for the BEAD program approved by NTIA, but there is significant unevenness in the speed of their progress through milestones since then. This uneven pace is likely to continue, meaning that BEAD funding for workforce development and digital skills will not roll out in many states until late 2025 or early 2026.
Louisiana: An audacious proposal for digital skills
Louisiana is the first state in the nation to have its BEAD Proposal get to the final stage of public comments. This revision of the initial proposal boldly expands on how the state will spend any “non-deployment” funds left remaining after it fulfills its mandate to bring broadband to unserved and under-served locations.
Remarkably, Louisiana anticipates having as much as $500 million available for non-deployment uses. This is far more than other states, due to differences in factors such as geography, population size, existing infrastructure, implementation approach, and leadership. (Learn more in this blog post on the technical details of Louisiana’s broadband approach.)
Within that half-billion dollars of non-deployment funds, Louisiana broadband officials are proposing to use $190 million for activities directly related to digital skills. This includes:
- Louisiana Board of Regents: $50 million to increase graduates in digitally-focused degrees, by expanding capacity for postsecondary degrees and credentials in high-demand occupations.
- Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections: $20 million to support transitional work training for incarcerated individuals and expanding work-based learning opportunities to build skills, including digital literacy.
- Louisiana State University AgCenter: $20 million to upskill farmers on advanced precision agriculture techniques.
- Louisiana Workforce Commission (LWC): $100 million for a suite of broadband workforce development activities, including: Development and implementation of workforce training programs that help participants acquire industry-recognized credentials in broadband and broadband-related occupations; job placement in broadband-related jobs, including roles created as a result of expanded broadband access; and provision of supportive services such as transportation, childcare, and digital literacy training to ensure that participants can successfully complete training programs and secure employment.
The first three categories of funding would be overseen directly by the agencies named above. For the final category, Louisiana’s BEAD proposal states that LWC would subgrant the funds to partner organizations via a competitive process, noting that:
Selected recipients will be incentivized to prioritize job placement and support participants from underrepresented communities, as well as to collaborate regionally. Applications that involve multiple workforce entities working together, particularly in rural and underserved areas, will receive higher scoring. Additionally, the program intends to have higher reimbursement rates for job placements of individuals who are the hardest to serve, such as those from rural areas, long-term unemployed, and those with significant barriers to employment.
Significantly, the state’s plan emphasizes the importance of partnerships between digital skills programming and existing state adult education and workforce development investments such as Work Ready U. This is NSC’s major recommendations, as the impact of digital equity funds will be magnified if providers capitalize on the existing expertise and infrastructure built up by the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act and related education and workforce systems.
Other highlights from around the country
- California has moved forward with a robust public input process on its proposed Digital Equity approach (see meeting recordings and notes), and expects to be releasing its DE Request for Proposals in early 2025.
- North Carolina digital inclusion officials and advocates responded to the severe hit of Hurricane Helene with an impressive array of rapid-response efforts and ongoing activities (see recent webinar). The state has slightly delayed some of its BEAD deadlines in response to the enormous disruption created by extreme weather.
- Florida has ambitious plans for investments in broadband workforce development, as outlined in this October 2024 blog post from NSC.
- Tennessee held a Digital Opportunity Summit in July 2024 and recently issued another round of Digital Skills, Education, and Workforce grants using American Rescue Plan Act funds. This is an especially effective tactic in providing stopgap funding to small nonprofit organizations as they await the release of DE funding. Learn more about Tennessee’s efforts in this Summer 2024 blog post from NSC.
