Rank: 34
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Lyon County: Incremental upgrades

Lyon County ranks 34 for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 86.81 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 1130 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $10.5 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Lyon has had incremental improvement in coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up since we have been tracking statistics. In 2023, the Marshall Area Chamber of Commerce hosted an event to talk about broadband options with SDN.

ITC has applied for a grant in the latest (and still in-process) Border to Border grant round. But there haven’t been any successful grant applications and that is why they retain their red ranking.

They may be concerned about being in a potentially precarious position because looking at access in the County using the FCC National Map there is a big discrepancy between wireline access (79.68 percent coverage) and wireline with fixed wireless (99.81 percent). Minnesota doesn’t currently take fixed wireless into consideration when defining areas eligible for grants; the federal government does include access to fixed wireless. That could make a big difference to who is eligible for BEAD funding.

Broadband Access:

Grants:

• Woodstock Telephone Company – Lynd FTTP – GRANT $325,548 (Lyon County) – This middle and last mile project will serve 203 underserved households, three underserved businesses and three underserved anchor institutions in the City of Lynd in Lyon County.
• 2017 – MVTC (Minnesota Valley Telephone Company, Inc.) – Milroy Broadband Project – GRANT $742,365
• 2017 – Woodstock Telephone Company – Balaton FTTP – GRANT $413,009
• 2016 – MIDCO CANBY TO MARSHALL MIDDLE MILE AND LAST MILE – GRANT AMOUNT: $623,000
• 2015 – MVTV Wireless Middle Mile – Grant award: $808,080

Checklist:

• Find more articles on broadband in Lyon County (http://tinyurl.com/hzlzzvs)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 53
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Lake of the Woods County: Big leap in last year

Lake of the Woods County ranks 53 (up six points) for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 78.82 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 696 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $6.5 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Lake of the Woods has been working on broadband for several years. They were a Blandin Broadband Community. In 2019, Wikstrom Telephone received a Border to Border award and they saw a big increase in access. In December 2022, Wikstrom received another award of $665,699 to serve rural sparsely populated areas in Kittson, Lake of the Woods, & Marshall in far NW Minnesota, passing 150 home, business, and farm locations.

Lake of the Woods continues to make incremental improvements but with limited engagement in the last few years and coverage hovering before 80 percent, they are not ranked as a red county.

Broadband Access:

Grants:

• 2022: Wikstrom Telephone Co. Inc, $665,699.00 (to serve Beltrami, Kittson, Lake of the Woods, Marshall)
• 2016 – SJOBERG’S INC. ROSEAU AND LAKE OF THE WOODS COUNTIES — GRANT: $354,740
• 2016 – WIKSTROM TELEPHONE COMPANY WIKTEL NW MN – GRANT: $950,823
• 2019: Wikstrom Telephone – Wiktel NW MN Broadband Project – GRANT $1,151,526

Find more articles on broadband in Lake of the Woods County (http://tinyurl.com/gpfu7dd)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 67
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Koochiching County: incremental increases

Koochiching County ranks 67 (down 4 points) for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 73.83 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 1818 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $16.9 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Koochiching County has been hovering around 73 percent coverage for a while now.  In 2023, Koochiching County was awarded a $77,300 Border to Border grant to serve 13 businesses along an established trucking route that is heavily used to connect Highway 53 and Highway 11 E through a partnership with Midco.

Hopefully that partnership will start a momentum toward improvement but at this point, Koochiching might need to see more demonstration of effort before losing the red ranking.

Grants

• 2023: Koochiching County – Koochiching County International Falls Economic Development – GRANT $77,300
• 2015 – Midcontinent Little Fork Middle Mile – Grant award: $277,448
• Paul Bunyan Communications – North Central Minnesota Fiber Project– GRANT $2,562,916

Checklist:

• Find more articles on broadband in Koochiching. (http://tinyurl.com/gom8mqy)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 74
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Kandiyohi County: from code yellow to red

Kandiyohi County ranks 74 for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 69.12 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 5427 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $50.4 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Kandiyohi County has been working on better broadband for years. They saw a big improvement in 2019, but have been stagnant since. They came close to getting better broadband with CTC and a grant but that didn’t work out in the end.

They had been hovering around 70 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They saw a decrease to 68.18 percent in 2022, which is probably due to increased granularity of reporting within a margin of error.

In December 2022, Federated was awarded a Border to Border grant of almost $5 million to serve 343 unserved and 302 underserved homes, businesses, farms, and community anchor institutions in the Kandiyohi County.  In 2023, Meeker Coop Light & Power was awarded two grants: one for $1.4 million to serve 185  locations in Kandiyohi and another  $533,959 to serve 216 households, farms, businesses and community anchor institutions. In June 2023,  United States Department of Agriculture announced a $19 million ReConnect round four grant to Meeker Cooperative Light and Power Association for a fiber-to-the-premises project covering portions of Meeker, Kandiyohi and Stearns counties.

Between Federated and Meeker Coop, they are applied for five grants in the latest Border to Border broadband grant round, which is still open but winner should be announced in early 2024.

Kandiyohi is creating partnerships that should help them get better broadband, especially when federal (BEAD) funding becomes available.

Broadband Access:

Grants:

• 2023: Meeker Coop Light & Power – Lake Elizabeth-East Lake Lillian Townships – GRANT $1,428,066
• 2023: Meeker Coop Light & Power – Harrison Township – GRANT $533,959
• 2022: Federated Telephone Cooperative, $4,913,505.50

• 2016 – FRONTIER KANDIYOHI INITIATIVE – GRANT: $1,015,275
• 2015 – MVTV Wireless Middle Mile – Grant award: $808,080
• 2017, Consolidated Telecommunications Co. (CTC) was awarded a $4.94 million grant to improve serves in New London, Spicer and Willmar, and Frontier was awarded a grant of $1.02 million to improve service in rural Kandiyohi County. Unfortunately, the CTC project did not work out.

Find more articles on broadband in Kandiyohi. (http://tinyurl.com/z9wk7bm)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 87
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Kanabec County: ranking last due to barriers

Kanabec County continues to hole rank 87 for broadband access out of 87 counties. Kanabec has 20.45 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 5853 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $54.4 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Kanabec remains at the bottom of the ranking with less than 25 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. Their access has decreased last year, which probably reflected an increased granularity of reporting within a margin of error.  It decreased again this year likely due to map challenges or corrections.

In December 2022, East Central Energy was awarded three Border to Border grants that could help close the broadband gap in Kanabec:

• 2022: East Central Energy – Isanti North – GRANT $5,000,000 to reach 1,988 unserved and underserved households and 142 unserved and underserved businesses, 353 Unserved and underserved farms, and 3 unserved and underserved community anchor institutions in Kanabec and Isanti Counties
• 2022: East Central Energy – Kanabec Central – GRANT $4,403,000 to serve approximately 2,145 households and 136 businesses, 280 farms, and 2 community anchor institutions, currently unserved and underserved in Kanabec and Pine Counties
• 2022: East Central Energy – Pine South – GRANT $4,750,000 to serve approximately 2,082 households, 122 businesses, 329 farms and 2 community anchor institutions currently unserved and underserved in Pine and Kanabec Counties

East Central Energy is giving Kanabec a lot of hope and the relationship will serve the community well when looking at applying for federal (BEAD) funding through the Office of Development but with less than 25 percent coverage, they retain their red ranking.

Broadband Access:

Grants:

• 2022: East Central Energy – Isanti North – GRANT $5,000,000
• 2022: East Central Energy – Kanabec Central – GRANT $4,403,000
• 2022: East Central Energy – Pine South – GRANT $4,750,000
• 2016 – BENTON COOPERATIVE TELEPHONE COMPANY BOCK – GRANT: $510,000

Checklist:

• Find more articles on broadband in Kanabec County. (http://tinyurl.com/gvyes6n)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 78
Code: Red
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Jackson County stuck near the bottom of the ranking

Jackson County ranks 78 for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 62.34 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up. They have 11709 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $15.9 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Jackson hovered at 68 percent coverage from 2017 to 2021 but saw a decrease in the last year to 61.98, which may reflect an increase in granularity of reporting. This year there is slight improvement that aligns with the 2022 decrease. In 2023, Federated Rural Electric got a  $7 million Border to Border grant to serve 480 households, businesses, and farms in Jackson County.

It looks like improvements are being made and the recent Federated grants may help start a momentum, but they stay at their red ranking with less than 70 percent coverage.

Jackson County is in a potentially precarious position because looking at access in Chippewa County using the FCC National Map there is a big discrepancy between wireline access (61.47 percent coverage) and wireline with fixed wireless (89.57 percent). Minnesota doesn’t currently take fixed wireless into consideration when defining areas eligible for grants; the federal government does include access to fixed wireless. That could make a big difference to who is eligible for BEAD funding.

Jackson County residents were awarded 27 line extension funding requests, which means state funding will subsidize last mile broadband extension to their homes.

Broadband Access:

Grants:

• 2023: Federated Rural Electric Assoc. – Jackson County Fiber-To-The-Premises – GRANT $7,068,222
• In 2010, Southwest Minnesota Broadband Services (SMBS) received ARRA funds to deploy fiber to the home in Jackson and other counties. Through SMBS, Jackson County was also part of the Blandin Broadband Communities initiative in 2015-2016
• 2015 – MVTV Wireless Middle Mile – Grant award: $808,080

Find more articles on broadband in Jackson County. (http://tinyurl.com/h3vyqx9)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.

Rank: 84
Code: Yellow
(See Blandin Foundation interactive map)

Isanti County: may be gaining momentum

Isanti County ranks 84 (down two) for broadband access out of 87 counties. They have 54.09 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up since 2017. They have 7169 households without access to broadband at that speed. Estimates indicate that it will cost $66.6 million to get to ubiquitous broadband in the county.

Isanti County have been hovering at about 50 percent coverage to broadband of 100 Mbps down and 20 up since 2017. They saw some increase in the last year.

Isanti County is served by one large national provider. That may be a bottleneck to better access in those areas, because a lack of competition can impact the drive for improvement.

In December 2022, Midcontinent received $1.6 million in a Border to Border grant to serve 545 unserved and underserved households and 17 unserved and underserved businesses, farms and community anchor institutions in portions of Isanti County and East Central Energy received $5 million to serve approximately 1,988 unserved and underserved households and 142 unserved and underserved businesses, 353 Unserved and underserved farms, and 3 unserved and underserved community anchor institutions in the Isanti and Kanabec Counties.

In 2023, East Central received another Border to Border grant  of almost $5 million to serve 1,990 locations in Isanti County.

With two grants going to East Central Energy and more coming through Midcontinent, a momentum seems to be building for Isanti County, which wins them an upgrade to yellow ranking.

Past grants:

• 2023: East Central Energy – Isanti South – GRANT $4,900,000
• 2022: Midcontinent Communications, $1,647,321.00
• 2022: East Central Energy – Isanti North – GRANT $5,000,000

Find more articles on broadband in Isanti County. (http://tinyurl.com/gozt2ka)

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)

The maps below on the left comes from the Office of Broadband Development interactive map, reflecting data updated on Oct 31, 2023. Red dots represent locations unserved with wireline broadband; the Orange dots represent underserved locations. The map on the right comes from the FCC National Broadband map showing access to wired and licensed fixed wireless access, the darker the color, the greater percentage of broadband coverage.