The FCC announces deadline of May 7, 2007, for filing applications for its Rural Health Care Pilot Program. Here is the description of the program straight from the FCC site:

The FCC has initiated a pilot funding program to facilitate the creation of a nationwide broadband network dedicated to health care, connecting public and private non-profit health care providers in rural and urban locations.

Also straight from the site, here is a description (with links added) of the program:

The pilot program is an enhanced funding initiative intended to help public and non-profit health care providers construct state- and region-wide broadband networks to provide telehealth and telemedicine services throughout the nation. The program will fund up to 85% of the costs of constructing those networks, as well as the costs of advanced telecommunications and information services that will ride over these networks. If selected, up to 85% of the cost of connecting to Internet2, or National LambdaRail (NLR), which are both dedicated nationwide backbones, may also be funded by the pilot program. Connection to Internet 2 or NLR is not required, but may be requested by the applicants. As with the existing rural health care program, the pilot program includes access to the public Internet if requested by the applicants.

I hope we’ll see some MN projects get funding. Good luck!