Governor Tate Reeves has signed a bill that establishes the Office of Broadband Expansion and Accessibility of Mississippi, which will serve under the Department of Finance and Administration. Governor Reeves says there are many rural areas in the state that do not have internet, have slow speeds, or have high costs that prevent Mississippians from accessing the internet.
“200 years ago, people in America moved near rivers and waterways, 100 years ago people in America moved to where the train tracks were. Today in America, people are moving to where there is connectivity,” says Reeves. “For us to be competitive in economic development, we’ve got to have more and more connectivity and ensure reliability of connectivity in our rural areas.”
This law does not have any funding directly tied to it, however the state has allocated around $162 million to fund broadband expansion. Sally Doty, who currently serves as the Executive Director for Public Utilities Staff, has been appointed to become the Director for this new department. She says in today’s standards, access to the internet is essential.
“Telehealth. I cared for my elderly parents for a long time, and the ability to not have to load my mother in a wheelchair in a handicap van, but to have a telehealth appointment, it is a game changer,” says Doty. “And then in education, our kids, they can’t do their homework. They can’t access different resources. So it’s just, I think, transformational.”
Doty says it could take a couple of months to get the department operational, but says she has a personal goal to foster significant broadband expansion within four years.
