 Good morning. Welcome. Thank you for joining us. Commissioner Carr. Oh, I'm really glad to do it. Thank you Is this your first time in hot springs or you know, I've passed through Arkansas before but this is my first time down in hot springs We're having a great time so far. Well, we're glad to have you. I just want to get started by talking a little bit about what you will Be talking about today Can you give us a tease of what what you'll be? Discussing so look, you know high-speed connectivity having affordable access to the internet is table stakes in today's economy for educating our kids for accessing health care Particularly for America's farmers and ranchers and I was that's a big industry here In Arkansas and the story is a bit mixed across the country really there are many many pockets of this country where we've made Tremendous progress bridging the digital divide over the last couple of years if you look back for instance in 2016 We put up something like 708 new cell sites total in the country that year. Well flash forward to 2019 and we had 46,000 new cell sites go up in this country and that's because at the federal level we were streamlining Regulations we were getting the rules right and that helped unleash a massive build, but it's been uneven particularly around the edges There's still too many parts of this country too many Americans that don't have connectivity The good news with respect to that is we are right now seeing an unprecedented infusion of federal and state dollars Being directed towards efforts to bridge the digital divide at the moment the challenge is less the money and it is more How do we coordinate among local state and federal leaders to make sure that money goes in the ground? That's why this Farm Bureau's connectivity summit is coming at exact right moment and bringing together all of the stakeholders to make Sure that the American people get the bang for the buck of these dollars that are being infused here and that they go into the ground And so is that a concern is making sure that the the money gets to the right? Projects and is funneled correctly and then and everything is tracked accordingly I mean is that a concern at the federal level? I think that's one of the biggest issues You know look there's always a lot of challenges One is infrastructure in terms of the regulations and it frankly costs too much and took too long to build internet Infrastructure in this country and at the federal level we spent the last three or four years Streamlining those rules we've got that in a pretty good spot. The next challenge was how do we have the money? That's needed to build out internet connectivity. Look you've got costs in the ballpark of $30,000 to run a mile of fiber and that makes a lot of business sense when you're downtown in a big city But when you're in parts of the country that have one or two people per square mile That 30,000 isn't going to pencil out for the private sector So we needed an infusion of federal support to do that and now particularly after COVID when everybody realizes the value of connectivity There's a lot of political support support for spending money on infrastructure So yes the point we're at now is how do we take that money and make sure it doesn't get? Sidetracked either to overbuilding places that already have service or Upgrading gold plating places that already have pretty good broadband How do we focus that money in areas that have zero megabits per second and this is particularly important for farm country? So a lot of people wonder well, it's not a lot of people there. Why do you need high-speed connectivity across America's farms and ranches? And I'll tell you here's the reason we now have the technology that can pull 18 gigabits worth of data off of a single plant This is imaging. This is soil sensors So you can take all that data and that's what we need to get productive efficient farming today Well 18 gigabits of data. That's about two times the amount of data that the average smartphone user Consumes every single month. So when you look out on, you know, Arkansas's soybeans rice fields every single Plant think of it as a smartphone and that will start to give you a sense for the data needs And why we need high-speed coverage to blanket this country not just concentrated population centers Yeah, and I think that is something we've seen that people don't take into account a lot of the farm equipment these days is very you know technology dependent and Not only that but then you have people dealing with education, you know They're their kids going to school in these rural areas and having some difficulty connecting even with schools We heard a lot during this COVID period of kids going to local McDonald's Just so they can connect, you know and do some of their schoolwork. So there's lots of challenges in those areas What's the Do you have any good examples of who's doing this right or you know states that have really attacked this in certain ways that you've seen That are models well, you're right that Combines tractors today. They're essentially many data centers. I mean obviously they have the ability to drive themselves I've been on many of them and you see the amount of connectivity that they have and that they need You're right during COVID-19 parents were driving kids McDonald's to use the Wi-Fi hotspots and we need to get the job done so that we don't see that anymore I think one thing that Arkansas is positioned very well with and I was at an event just recently and obviously at this summit as Well with Governor Hutchinson is they put in place a grant Body that can take federal or state dollars and award that money to broadband projects So I think that's an important model that the state is doing right. I think broadband mapping is another key Congress directed the FCC over a year ago gave us a hundred million dollars After that to stand up nationwide broadband masks to help states Federal government accurately identify right here's where we're missing connectivity. Let's put money there And until we get those maps completed That's a bit of a choke point with respect to federal funding because I don't want to be pouring billions of dollars And that's what we've got billions of dollars not knowing exactly where there's connectivity There's not we've got to identify with precision the unconnected communities And I know that's something you've talked a bit about is the mapping process Where do things stand in the mapping process? Is there anything states can do to help with that process? Well, unfortunately, it's a bit of a black box right now and it shouldn't be so I work at the FCC and At the beginning of the year in January or February, you know I asked our new leadership when we can get these maps done and the answer I got was not this year I Then called for the FCC to complete the maps this fall, which is about now But we haven't gotten any indication of when the FCC's new leadership is going to complete that now It's a hard project. We've got staff working very very hard to get it done I don't grudge what they're doing I just think we should be more up front with our timeline because then that will decide Can I wait another month for this map and then use that to drive my? State effort or is it going to be another year down the road when I maybe got to stand at my own state initiative to Look at mapping, but ideally we'd be running the mapping solely at the federal level because we want one map That's accurate. We don't need a lot of inaccurate maps, right? Is there anything you know people can do with the you know grass roots level to help You know move that process along or is there anything that you want to hear from people out there? When you're getting feedback or what's the process there for people to say we want to be a part of this And what can we do to help? Yeah, you know, you know state reps You know just everyday people yes speaking up and sort of asking where we are in that process But I think the most important thing is what we're going to do here today Which is you're bringing federal leaders local leaders state leaders together make sure we know who each other are that We're talking with each other that we're on the same page. I mean events like this You may be able to see it in a tangible way But this is gonna make a big difference to make sure that we move quickly and efficiently with internet builds Great. Well, we appreciate you being here today. Look forward to hearing from you later And thank you for taking time to join us really appreciate it. Thanks