With a new data dashboard, advocates and stakeholders working to advance digital equity can see state and local stats on where and how $14.2 billion in federal funding is being spent via the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), which was designed to help American households pay for the monthly cost of their Internet subscription.
The Massachusetts Healthy Aging Collaborative encourages communities working to become more age- and dementia friendly to use the data to promote local engagement of older adults who may be eligible for the program promoting digital access.The Institute for Local Self-Reliance updated a previous version of the same dashboard that includes data on spending around the ACP. That program launched at the beginning of 2022 as a revamped continuation of the Emergency Broadband Benefit program.
The dashboard includes a breakdown by state for how enrollment numbers stand (as well as an estimate for the amount spent in each state so far), the current national eligible enrollment rate, information for 30 metropolitan areas, how much is being spent on service support versus devices, how many households are using the ACP for mobile versus wireline service, and the total left in the ACP fund.
The ACP program includes a consumer outreach toolkit with many resources to raise awareness and connect people with internet service.