Local and federal efforts aim to address the digital divide in the Washington region

In Washington DC, the digital gap has been a longstanding challenge. A quarter of DC households do not have broadband internet connections, with those numbers being over 35% in wards 5, 7, and 8, wards with predominantly Black populations.

DC’s disparities are greater than those elsewhere in the Washington region. In most Northern Virginia counties, less than 10% of residents lack a broadband subscription. In Maryland, 21.9% of households in Prince George’s County, 15.3% in Montgomery County, and 11.4% in Howard County are not connected to broadband. Much like in DC, broadband adoption rates are lower than the statewide averages for Maryland and Virginia’s Black residents.

DC residents’ lack of high-speed internet is not driven by a lack of coverage, as inadequate infrastructure is only a barrier for 3,000 of the 53,000 households in DC that are not connected to broadband. Instead, it is largely driven by cost — a 2011 survey on broadband adoption from the District of Columbia Office of the Chief Technology Officer determined that low-income residents are “significantly less likely to use broadband at home.” According to the 2019 American Community Survey, 29.62% of DC households that make under $50,000/year do not have a broadband internet subscription.

This digital divide has numerous negative effects on those who do not have broadband. Not being connected to high speed internet can “impact the fairness of remote court proceedings,” prevent people from accessing government services such as unemployment programs, and bar people from being able to attend telehealth visits. Most crucially, it has become a significant barrier to educational access, especially for DC’s students of color. According to a 2020 study, 27% of Black students and 25% of Latino students in DC do not have high-speed internet at home, compared to just 5% of DC’s white students, making it difficult for many Black and Latino students in the city to fully participate in virtual learning. In response to these challenges, there have been efforts at both the local and national level in the past year to make broadband more affordable.

The federal infrastructure bill’s focus on expanding broadband access has attracted attention as a potential solution for the digital divide nationwide. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act allocates $42.5 billion in grants that will go directly to states and territories, with the District receiving approximately $100 million over 5 years through this program.

These grants can be used to expand broadband access through the construction of infrastructure and through the expansion of service to underserved communities, but they can also be used to provide subgrants that would go to encouraging broadband adoption in areas that already have access. This would enable the District to allocate its federal grant money towards helping the city transition to making broadband more affordable. The act also requires that any service provider that receives a subgrant under this program offer at least one low-cost broadband option for subscribers. What would be considered “low-cost” in DC would be determined by the District and by the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information.

In addition to making broadband more affordable through grants and regulations, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act has made the Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) program permanent.

The EBB program began on May 11, 2021, after being authorized in the December 2020 appropriations bill, and it offered some qualifying lower-income households a discount of $50 per month off the cost of their home internet. The EBB eliminated over half of the $70 average monthly cost that DC’s lower-income residents pay for high speed internet, and by the end of 2021, 29,456 households in DC, 130,811 households in Maryland, and 165,014 households in Virginia were enrolled in it.

However, only $3.2 billion in funds had been appropriated for the EBB program nationally, as it had been designed only as a temporary measure to last during the pandemic. A permanent extension of the program was included in the infrastructure bill, which retitled it the Affordable Connectivity Fund and allocated $14.2 billion in federal funds towards reducing broadband costs for lower-income households. More households will be eligible under the redesigned program, but there will only be a $30 monthly discount. In addition, there are concerns that the funding will not last longer than 3 years without the further development of a framework for funding and administering universal service from the FCC.

Due to these shortcomings, the work of state governments in the region to expand broadband access remains crucial. In April, 10 DC councilmembers introduced Bill 24-200, the Internet Equity Amendment Act of 2021. Under the bill, the Office of the Chief Technology Officer would establish a Digital Equity Division, to both determine recommended connection speeds and ensure within 180 days of the act’s enactment that all DC households be connected to the internet at those speeds at a cost of less than 0.5% of their household income. This would be accomplished through partnerships with internet service providers and through the DC-Net program, which provides access to affordable broadband for District residents. Eventually, the office would explore options including building a city-owned and operated broadband service. While there were public hearings on the bill in September and October, it has not advanced beyond this stage.

Maryland has also taken steps towards making broadband more affordable. In August, Governor Hogan and legislative leaders announced the creation of the Maryland Emergency Broadband Benefit Subsidy Program, which provides an additional cumulative discount on broadband costs of up to $15/month to Marylanders who are enrolled in the EBB program.

No similar plans appear to have been moved on in Virginia — both former Gov. Ralph Northam and recently inaugurated Gov. Glenn Youngkin have been more focused on expanding broadband access to rural areas of the state.