Your input is desired to help create State broadband policy.  Please use our Contact Us page to send your views and ideas.

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Broadband is a road home for Arkansas graduates.  No broadband is a road to far away places ...   "Broadband" means high-speed Internet service.  In Governor Beebe’s first State of the State address he stated that “in today’s world, just learning to type on the keyboard won’t suffice.  Our kids deserve broadband infrastructure that connects them to the Internet and provides technology equity."  True technology equity is not had as long as there is another state or another nation with better broadband than Arkansas. Every person and organization in Arkansas needs access to broadband, and that means broadband that is fast enough and reliable enough for Arkansas to compete with any other place in the world.  This is because broadband is essential to economic development, job creation, modern education, health care, and a quality of life that Arkansans deserve.  It is also essential to keeping the maximum number of our college graduates in Arkansas after they graduate. Our Arkansas broadband service providers are doing a great job in deploying broadband wherever they can find a reasonable business case, but they need our support.  State-wide broadband efforts in neighboring states and the rapid spread of broadband in other countries make it clear that our State must move more quickly in order to be competitive in today's global economy.  Act 604 of 2007 created the Arkansas Broadband Council to advise the Governor and Legislature on policy to make this happen.