Peters Urges Congress to Extend Funding for Affordable Connectivity Program to Lower High-Speed Internet Costs for Michiganders

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Gary Peters (MI) joined 31 of his Senate colleagues in urging Congressional leaders to extend funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), which provides financial assistance to access high-speed internet for over 800,000 households in Michigan and more than 21 million working families across the nation. Senator Peters helped create this program through the bipartisan infrastructure law to lower high-speed internet costs for Michiganders and help more families and communities get connected. As a result of the program’s popularity, its funds are set to be depleted in a few months, far before the anticipated date.

“We write to urge you to extend funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), which provides over 21 million working families with financial assistance for broadband access, to help bridge the digital divide so they can continue to afford the broadband services they need for work, school, health care, and more,” wrote the Senators. “Should ACP funding not be extended, millions of Americans could be at risk of losing access to broadband.”

“Failing to extend funding would be irresponsible,” they continued. “We urge you to extend funding for the ACP in a government appropriations package and include a long-term solution that ensures efficient spending of taxpayer dollars.”

The full letter can be found HERE.  

Senator Peters is committed to expanding high-speed internet access across Michigan. In June 2023, he announced that Michigan would receive more than $1.5 billion in federal funding from the Broadband, Equity, Access, and Deployment Program, known as BEAD, to increase high-speed internet access. This funding was also made available by the bipartisan infrastructure law that Peters helped enact. In June, Senator Peters also announced that the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) awarded more than $61 million in federal funding for the Peninsula Fiber Network to connect unserved and underserved communities in Michigan to high-speed internet. This project will place 535 miles of new broadband fiber to connect local networks to high-capacity national and regional networks, which will bring high-speed internet access to over 35,000 homes in rural counties in Michigan and increase the resiliency and reliability of internet infrastructure across the state. The funding is made available by the Enabling Middle Mile Broadband Infrastructure Program, which is also funded by the bipartisan infrastructure law.

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