By Sara Jerome
The spending bill approved by the House on Saturday includes an amendment that would defund a broadband grant program at the Agriculture Department.
Rep. Jim Matheson (D-Utah) introduced an amendment to defund the Community Connect broadband grant program, which pays for broadband infrastructure projects and community computer centers in rural areas. The program had a budget of around $13 million last year.
Matheson, who ultimately opposed the GOP spending bill, said he offered the amendment because Community Connect is an “ineffective program.”
“Cutting wasteful or duplicative programs in every account are all part of the equation if we are ever to return to balanced budgets. Cuts may be painful, they may be unpopular, but given what we are up against, they are necessary,” he said in a statement about the bill.
Article Continued on The Hill…
Seems strange that a politician is looking to cut spending for a bill that benefits his constituents until you realize that he eventually voted against the spending bill.
About Mark Milliman
Mark Milliman is a Principal Consultant at Inphotonics Research driving the adoption and assisting local governments to plan, build, operate, and lease access open-access municipal broadband networks. Additionally, he works with entrepreneurs and venture capitalists to increase the value of their intellectual capital through the creation of strategic product plans and execution of innovative marketing strategies. With more than 22 years of experience in the telecommunications industry that began at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Mark has built fiber, cable, and wireless networks around the world to deliver voice, video, and data services. His thorough knowledge of all aspects of service delivery from content creation to the design, operation, and management of the network is utilized by carriers and equipment manufacturers. Mark conceived and developed one of the industry's first multi-service provisioning platform and is multiple patent holder. He is active in the IEEE as a senior member. Mark received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Iowa State University and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.
