Rank: 41
Code: Green
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Clay County: consistent, incremental improvements over years

Clay County’s rank dropped from 25 to 41. Clay County will benefit from a recent $5.1 million ReConnect award to reach about 500 locations. That will get them much closer to ubiquitous coverage.

Clay County gets a green ranking because they have 90 percent coverage and were awarded the $5 million ReConnect award.

• Over the years, Clay County (or cities within) has not invested in matches for any successful MN Broadband grants.
• Clay County will benefit from a 2024 $970,411 MN Broadband grant (Round 10) award that will serve 54 locations.
• Clay County will benefit from 21 line extension awards (Rounds 1 and 2), which extend broadband to individual locations.
• Last years’ estimates indicated that it would cost $2.6 million to get ubiquitous broadband in the county. (I haven’t updated the number because recent report offers scenarios of costs based on BEAD funding rules that make current estimates less predictable than in the past. Yet, I think the number is still helpful.)
• In 2022, Clay ranked 27 using Microsoft’s Digital Equity Tool, which looks at various factors of a community.
• Clay County will benefit from a ReConnect award: Red River Rural Telephone Association – The investment will be used to deploy high-speed fiber optics to 17 businesses, 55 farms, and one school in Clay County, and 482 people will benefit. They received $5,166,742 as a grant.

2024 Grants

• County: Clay
  Red River Communications
  Red River – Rural Hawley
  Grant: $970,411
  Local Match: $970,411
  Total Budget: $1,940,822
  Red River Rural Telephone Association (Red River Communications), seeks to build a fiber-to the-premise (FTTP) broadband project in Rural Hawley, located within Clay County, Minnesota. The proposed FTTP project would provide 54 currently unserved locations with access to 2.5 Gbps symmetrical broadband with a capacity of 10 Gbps per location. The rural farm centered community is located 27 miles east of the county seat of Moorhead, MN. Red River Rural Telephone Association is a progressive telecommunications Cooperative maintaining 2,400 miles of fiber with 4,700 customers. Clay County is committing $5,000 toward project costs.

Past Grants

• 2022: 702 Communications – Western Clay County Kragnes Township– GRANT $2,624,830
• 2019: Arvig (Loretel Systems, Inc.) – Cormorant Lakes Area Project – GRANT $430,780

Find more articles on broadband in Clay County. (http://tinyurl.com/hcgg9rm)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on December 16, 2024. Red dots represent locations unserved locations. Above I have tracked wireline access because that is the Minnesota definition of broadband. The info below includes wired and wireless. BEAD includes fixed wireless connections as served locations. (I wrote more on the distinction between the two last year, which may be if interest in the numbers range greatly for your county.)

I am doing the annual look at broadband in each county – based on maps from the Office of Broadband Development and news gathered from the last year. I’m looking at progress toward the 2022 (25 Mbps down and 3 Mbps up) and 2026 (100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up) and will code each:

• Red (yikes)
• Yellow (warning)
• Green (good shape)