The White House
For Immediate Release
March 09, 2016
FACT SHEET: President Obama Announces ConnectALL Initiative
Delivering on the Promise of Broadband & Access to Technology for All Americans
Connectivity is a path to greater opportunity. In today’s world, broadband and fluency with technology fuel economic growth, provide access to the world’s knowledge, promote skill development, and build stronger and more connected communities.
During President Obama’s seven years in office, we’ve seen unprecedented gains in wiring our nation for the future, including a tripling of the average home Internet speed, covering 98 percent of Americans with fast 4G/LTE mobile broadband, and doubling the number of schools connected to high-speed Internet. As a result, we’ve seen a technology sector that spans coast to coast, the creation of millions of high-paying jobs, and a revolution in the way students learn in the classroom.
To further our efforts, and to ensure that low-income Americans can seize the opportunities of the digital age, President Obama is unveiling ConnectALL, an initiative to help Americans from across the country, at every income level, get online and have the tools to take full advantage of the Internet. Today, the Administration is submitting its recommendation that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) reform a $1.5 billion per year Reagan-era phone subsidy program to turn it into a 21st Century national broadband subsidy to help low-income Americans get online. Alongside this FCC filing, the Administration is releasing a new study on the economic importance of broadband and calling for nonprofits, businesses, technology experts, and Government to join a national effort to reach the ConnectALL goal of connecting 20 million more Americans to broadband by 2020.
BUILDING ON SEVEN YEARS OF BROADBAND GROWTH
Today’s announcement rounds out seven years of progress expanding broadband, combining smart policy with unprecedented investment to deliver faster connectivity to more Americans in their homes, through their mobile devices, and where they learn and work. As a result, tens of millions more Americans are online now than when the President took office; his ConnectED Initiative has given over 20 million more K-12 students access to broadband in their classrooms and libraries; and 28 communities have come together under the banner of ConnectHome to ensure kids living in public housing have a reliable way to get online and do their homework.
ENSURING LOW-INCOME AMERICANS AREN’T LEFT BEHIND
Even with the significant progress we’ve made, more work remains to help all Americans access the economic benefits of broadband, especially low-income households. Families earning under $25,000 a year are about half as likely to have the Internet at home as families that are the most well-off. A new Issue Brief released today by the Council of Economic Advisers outlines how being offline is more than inconvenient; it creates specific economic costs, especially for job-seekers unable to access online job search tools. Today, because of a digital divide, low-income Americans have a harder time accessing these tools, and unemployed workers without home Internet access take a longer time to find employment. Given these costs, we cannot be satisfied if broadband is out of reach for anyone in America, and today, President Obama is acting to make that a part of the past.
So today, the President is launching ConnectALL to ensure more Americans have the broadband they need to get a job, engage their community, and deliver opportunity to their children by:
· Increasing the affordability of broadband for low-income Americans. Today, the Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), on behalf of the Administration, is filing comments in support of the FCC’s effort to reform its Lifeline program to address the way people communicate in the 21st century. When Lifeline was first created under President Reagan, it was designed to provide low-income Americans with financial assistance to purchase affordable phone service, so the most vulnerable Americans were connected to the rest of the country. In 2005, President George W. Bush expanded the program to include mobile phones. Now in 2016, when we use the Internet to communicate more than ever, it is time to modernize Lifeline and make sure that all Americans can access the broadband services they need. The Lifeline reforms the Administration is recommending today would give the 12 million households currently using the subsidy for phone service immediate help paying their monthly broadband bill. And it has the potential to benefit tens of millions more. The modernization we are outlining:
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· Initiating a national service effort to deliver digital literacy skills. To increase access to digital literacy training, the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS), the Federal agency that engages millions of Americans in service and in developing community solutions, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), which is the primary source of Federal support for the nation’s 123,000 libraries and 35,000 museums, are collaborating on a Digital Literacy Pilot Project. AmeriCorps VISTA members will support libraries, museums and associated community organizations located in tribal and rural communities. The goal is to build capacity and increase digital literacy efforts, complementing the Administration’s work to increase broadband adoption among low-income households.
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· Increasing access to affordable devices. In order to promote the reuse of equipment no longer needed by the federal government, the General Services Administration (GSA) will lead an inter-agency effort to re-engineer the Computers for Learning program to expand access to devices for more organizations that help provide digital literacy and training for low-income Americans. Computers for Learning allows schools and nonprofit organizations to take advantage of unneeded federal computer equipment. In 2014, 38 Federal Agencies donated thousands of devices, and the program’s reforms are designed to significantly increase these numbers.
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· Announcing the development of a tool to support broadband planning. To empower more communities with strategies to support and accelerate local broadband planning efforts, NTIA’s BroadbandUSA program is launching the Community Connectivity Initiative, which will create a comprehensive online assessment tool to help community leaders identify critical broadband needs and connect them with expertise, tools, and resources for overcoming the challenges to expanded broadband deployment and adoption.
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· Bringing together private sector companies helping to deliver affordable connectivity. Companies are also lending their support for low-income families in their service areas. Today, Cox Communications is announcing it will host more than 200 events across the nation for low-income K-12 families, automatically qualifying attendees for their low-cost broadband option. Later this year, the company will partner with Univision to promote internet adoption through live programming, public service announcements and community events in such markets as Phoenix, Las Vegas, and San Diego.
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· Marshaling philanthropic support for digital inclusion. To increase access to resources to support digital inclusion efforts under way in communities across the country, later this year the Administration will convene leaders in the philanthropic, non-profit, and private sectors to a summit focused on building on our progress to date and delivering on ConnectALL’s vision of connecting 20 million more Americans to broadband by 2020.
Joelle Tessler
Manager of Stakeholder Relations and Outreach
BroadbandUSA
Office of Telecommunications and Information Applications
National Telecommunications and Information Administration
U.S. Department of Commerce