The MN Broadband Task Force heard from Godfrey Enjady (President, National Tribal Telecommunications Association) on the Connect New Mexico Broadband Tribal Working Group and overview of leadership on the National Tribal Telecommunications Association 2026 NTTA Broadband Midwest Regional Summit and from Anis Khemakhem (Chief Commercial Officer, Clearfield Inc.) on workforce development and BABA compliance and its practical implications on broadband deployment.

Data centers (including micro-scale data centers) and AI were hot topics in both presentations.

Here’s the agenda with questions and high level notes:

10:00 a.m. – 10:05 a.m. Welcome from Teddy Bekele, Chair, Minnesota Governor’s Task Force on Broadband and approval of minutes from February and April Task Force meetings.

10:05 a.m. – 10:15 a.m. Open the floor for Task Force member share-out from the April 29 in-person meeting: did any topics come up in discussion that should be considered for the annual report; are there any speakers that would be helpful to hear from at future Task Force meetings?

• People like line extension

10:15 a.m. – 10:45 a.m. Presentation from Godfrey Enjady (President, National Tribal Telecommunications Association) on the Connect New Mexico Broadband Tribal Working Group and overview of leadership on the National Tribal Telecommunications Association 2026 NTTA Broadband Midwest Regional Summit.

• Looking at AI for language preservation
• Q: There’s a New Mexico Task Force – is there also an Office of Broadband Development?
  Yes, there are two. OBAE and another
• You are working on microdata centers. Can you tell us more?
  The hyper-scalers are getting all of the attention and not good attention. So we’re working on how we can provide services to the tribes. We’re looking at private networks.
• DEED person says – nice hear to hear about using spiritual ways to answer community questions.
  We like to use stories.

10:45 a.m. – 11:15 a.m. Presentation from Anis Khemakhem (Chief Commercial Officer, Clearfield Inc.) on workforce development and BABA compliance and its practical implications on broadband deployment.

• Nice training initiative. We work on recommendations to the Governor. How can we help you?
  Encourage folks to share the information.

11:25 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. Office of Broadband Development (OBD) overview and updates from Bree Maki (Executive Director, OBD).

• Thanks to everyone came to the big conference – it was sold out
• BEAD – continuing to work on finalizing the contract and contracts with providers and environmental planning. There have been some minor location changes.
• No new info on non-deployment dollars. Had to look at all technologies equally. There is $300 million in unspent.
• There are supply line issues with BEAD. OBD had a call with local providers and NTIA.
• Providers should put in BEAD waivers now – for BABA and other.
• Also working on definition of onerous AI. MN Legislation wrapped but nothing deemed onerous by OBD. (One related to age verification could be an issue.)
• There are a couple of providers who are eager to get going. Others are watching carefully.
• There are three providers who have left BEAD. Working on finding a provider for those locations. Working on tribal consent.
• Closed 39 old grant projects; added 28 new ones. Lots of site monitoring.
• Annual reports will be coming out June 30
• Line Extension: closing Line Extension 4 at 1pm on May 22. This is from money that was shifted from other areas and MDE.
• Treasury put out some project guidance that talked about extension of capital funds – depending on project. Deadline is July 31.

11:45 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Open the floor to other business, next meeting Thursday June 18 (virtual), and meeting wrap-up.