[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 104 (Thursday, June 20, 2019)]
[House]
[Page H4928]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          ACCESS TO BROADBAND

  (Mr. DELGADO asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. DELGADO. Mr. Speaker, as we work through this year's 
appropriations package, I want to thank my colleagues for passing my 
amendment to fix our broken broadband mapping system.
  Access to broadband is a timely and urgent need in my district, and 
if we don't address how we map and evaluate who has high-speed 
Internet, small business owners, students, and farmers will be left 
behind.
  The FCC's recent Broadband Deployment Report states that more than 21 
million Americans lack access to high-speed internet, but everyone in 
this body and back home knows there are many more out there.
  The issue is that we evaluate broadband coverage based on census-
block mapping. In other words, if one house on one block can purchase 
coverage, the whole block is deemed ``served.''
  We will never close the digital divide relying on bad data. My 
amendment prevents the National Telecommunications and Information 
Administration from relying solely on census-block data for broadband 
availability maps.
  Bad data yields bad maps, and this critical amendment will put an end 
to it. I thank my colleagues for joining me in support of this crucial 
amendment.

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