Great Plains Communications wins $3.54M in broadband funding from Nebraska PSC
Great Plains Communications (GPC) was awarded $3.54 million as one of the winning bidders in the Nebraska Public Service Commission’s (PSC) 2024 Reverse Auction to expand broadband access to more than 1,100 households in unserved areas of Nebraska.
The service provider’s funding will assist in providing high-speed fiber broadband services to approximately 310 unserved households in rural areas of Columbus, Hebron, Kearney, Madison, Mead, Monroe, Nebraska City, Palmer, Seward and Superior, Nebraska.
GPC has begun engineering and design with all areas projected for completion in the next 48 months.
The 2024 reverse auction was designed to provide broadband-capable voice service to rural areas where telecommunication carriers Frontier and Windstream have traditionally served by redistributing Nebraska Universal Service Fund (NUSF) support that was unused and subsequently withheld from the two companies. Bidding began on January 22, with the final round on March 11.
Joe Pellegrini, president and COO of Great Plains Communications, said the reverse auction program will “maximize available broadband funding to benefit more communities.”
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About the Author
Sean BuckleySean Buckley
Sean is the Editor-in-Chief of Lightwave. He establishes and executes Lightwave's editorial strategy across its website, email newsletters, events, and other information products. Before coming to Lightwave in July 2023, he served as editor of Broadband Communities. Earlier, he served as senior editor of FierceTelecom and the editor of the former Telecommunications Magazine. He got his start in the optical industry in 1998 when he became the editor of enterprise and optical networks at Information Gatekeepers. He has a BA in English from the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and lives in Dracut, Mass, with his wife, two sons, and his cat, Dove.
