Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Tim Stenebek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 2: June is Equality Month here at Bloomberg, So every Monday
Speaker 2: and Thursday in the month of June we're looking at
Speaker 2: all aspects of equality. Today, our focus is on the
Speaker 2: lack of equal access when it comes to connectivity, something
Speaker 2: we often talk about at Bloomberg. And I feel, like
Speaker 2: you know, Matt coming off the pandemic, when we saw
Speaker 2: kids working from home or trying to work from home
Speaker 2: and then you know, parking in a lot outside of
Speaker 2: McDonald's or something because they just didn't have internet access.
Speaker 2: I thought things were going to get a lot better,
Speaker 2: but as you remind me, it takes time.
Speaker 1: Well, look, that's the biggest problem with the lack of
Speaker 1: broadband nationwide is that when schools sent all the kids
Speaker 1: home and said, you know, work from your laptops or
Speaker 1: you know, telecommute with your iPads, not everyone could do
Speaker 1: that for various reasons. It's expensive right to own that
Speaker 1: kind of equipment. And even if you are a rich person,
Speaker 1: if you're living in some remote area of the country,
Speaker 1: you just can't get online. So do we have to
Speaker 1: roll out fiber is there are there other options. We
Speaker 1: just saw for Elon Musk getting approval from the Pentagon
Speaker 1: to provide starlinks to Ukraine. But we also talk about
Speaker 1: wireless broadband spreading the joys of high speed connectivity across
Speaker 1: the country. Still, it's a big country. It's a very
Speaker 1: very very big country, and I don't think a lot
Speaker 1: of Americans realize just how big it is.
Speaker 2: You're right, You're right, things we take for granted in
Speaker 2: big metro cities is not the same across the country. Well.
Speaker 2: Heidi Binko is co founder and executive director of the
Speaker 2: Just Transition Fund, established in twenty fifteen by Rockefeller Family
Speaker 2: Fund in the Appalachia Funders Network. They are about helping
Speaker 2: communities tap into federal funding opportunities, including those in connectivity
Speaker 2: and broadband. She joins us on Zoom from Charlottesville, Virginia. Heidi,
Speaker 2: good to have you here, and you've been listening to
Speaker 2: us rant on a little bit. Tell us a little
Speaker 2: bit about your organization, the work that you're doing to
Speaker 2: connect more Americans.
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks Carolyn, Thanks Matthew for having me today. I'm
Speaker 3: really glad you're talking about broadband. I think there's a
Speaker 3: sort of a quiet crisis in America that you're right, Carol,
Speaker 3: that those of us in metro areas really don't think about.
Speaker 3: So the Just Transition Fund is a nonprofit philanthropic organization
Speaker 3: that I founded a number of years back, and essentially
Speaker 3: we help communities affected by the downturn of the coal
Speaker 3: industry diversify and grow their economies. So we're helping them realize,
Speaker 3: they realize their own vision and vision for a thriving,
Speaker 3: vibrant economic future. And we realized along the way that
Speaker 3: we cannot work on economic development. You know, as you
Speaker 3: said in your opening statement, you can't work on workforce development.
Speaker 3: Kids can't access the internet for educational purposes if there
Speaker 3: is not a good broadband connection in these places. And
Speaker 3: people in urban areas don't realize this. I think most
Speaker 3: people don't realize it. But this problem is particularly crude
Speaker 3: acute in rural America. It's very It's even more acute
Speaker 3: in the rural communities in which we work. So the
Speaker 3: third of the coal communities that we work and don't
Speaker 3: have access. And it's even worse than some places like
Speaker 3: West Virginia the nation.
Speaker 2: It's interesting, I'm thinking right now, you know, we're on
Speaker 2: radio obviously, but we're also on YouTube, and we're on
Speaker 2: Bloomberg Originals are streaming service, and for something like here,
Speaker 2: you know, people take it for granted again, like being
Speaker 2: able to kind of tap into us on multiple platforms.
Speaker 2: But you're right, it's not the case across certainly rural
Speaker 2: parts of the country. What are the government programs that
Speaker 2: are out there in a week where we're talking a
Speaker 2: lot about governments.
Speaker 1: Well, we have the big broadbands, true, what's it called
Speaker 1: broadband equity, access and deployment deployment, right, the Bad Program,
Speaker 1: which is Bad Program forty two billion dollars.
Speaker 2: So at least it's like a lot.
Speaker 1: At least the government realizes that there's a problem, right
Speaker 1: and are trying to do something about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's exactly right, Matthew. The Bad Program, which is
Speaker 3: administered by the the NTIA, the National Telecommunications Information Agency,
Speaker 3: is one of several agencies that is receiving a lot
Speaker 3: of money for broadband to speed broadband adoption across the
Speaker 3: federal government. Actually, I don't think people realize it, but
Speaker 3: there's over one hundred billion dollars available through this administration
Speaker 3: to support broadband access access. The problem is it's not
Speaker 3: that easy for communities, particularly rural communities or low capacity communities,
Speaker 3: to access those funds. So that's that's where that's where
Speaker 3: the Just Transition Fund comes in.
Speaker 1: So what do you do? I can imagine because this
Speaker 1: country really is so big that it's not just West
Speaker 1: Virginia or I don't know, Kansas, but there are multiple
Speaker 1: states where you know, the population per square mile is
Speaker 1: less than one, right, So how do you you can't
Speaker 1: roll out fiber to all of those places? Right? Is
Speaker 1: it about fixed wireless access?
Speaker 3: It's about a lot of different technologies and in your right, right,
Speaker 3: the problem is particularly particularly acute in places like southern Illinois,
Speaker 3: Western Colorado, different places in Ohio, all across the.
Speaker 1: Country, Wyoming, Mexico exactly.
Speaker 3: Right, Like the tribal communities are hit particularly hard the
Speaker 3: Navajo Nation. In some areas, ninety percent of the communities
Speaker 3: can access can't access the internet. Right, So it's it's
Speaker 3: it's it's particularly bad. And essentially what we do is
Speaker 3: we act as an early stage investor to help communities
Speaker 3: access the federal capital capital they need to build out
Speaker 3: and access broadband infrastructure. So whether it's you know, fixed
Speaker 3: wireless or or broadband or fixed wireless or or starlink
Speaker 3: or what have you. There, there are different ways to
Speaker 3: access the federal programs. Do you guys into some of
Speaker 3: our Yeah, some of our communities out in out in
Speaker 3: tribal areas are working on that are using that. The
Speaker 3: problem with starlink is that it's really expensive now, right,
Speaker 3: and that's another problem, right, I mean that's what makes
Speaker 3: this broadband problem so hard to deal with, right, Like,
Speaker 3: it's not only a problem of physical infrastructure of access,
Speaker 3: but it's also a problem affordability.
Speaker 2: What's a successful project that you guys have done and
Speaker 2: we've just got about thirty seconds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, great project that we worked on was in West Virginia.
Speaker 3: We helped a series of communities access more than forty
Speaker 3: five million dollars in federal funds and it ended up
Speaker 3: connecting over thirty thousand of the most disconnected households in
Speaker 3: West Virginia. So those kids that you heard about during
Speaker 3: the pandemic that we're going to the McDonald's Wi Fi
Speaker 3: right parking lot to get Wi Fi to do their homework,
Speaker 3: that's what this project helped.
Speaker 2: Wow, that's amazing, that's very good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, yeah, because what a disadvantage, and it's tough
Speaker 1: that some families, so many families had to endure that.
Speaker 1: Hopefully they don't have to go through that again anytime soon.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and especially in a world, especially when it comes to
Speaker 2: things like school. I mean, that's how kids, that's how
Speaker 2: they work. It's just very different, certainly from when I
Speaker 2: went to school, and maybe when you went to school.
Speaker 1: A little different from back in the seventies.
Speaker 2: Here, Heidi, thank you so much. I'm glad we were
Speaker 2: able to check in with you. Heidibinko, she's co founder
Speaker 2: and executive director of the Just Transition Fund, joining us
Speaker 2: on Zoom from Charlottesville, Virginia. No, I just remember with
Speaker 2: my own daughter, Like it's like all these assignments came
Speaker 2: in on, like laptops and everything, and how they communicate
Speaker 2: with teachers and great, like it's just different.
Speaker 1: We should revolt, all right, Okay.
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