The primary goal of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) is to provide a fiscal boost to the Nation during this economic crisis and to lay the foundation for long-term growth and development of our economy. One of the pillars of the ARRA is that providing access to broadband services will increase economic development and improve the quality of life for all Americans. The ARRA provides $7.2 billion dollars of stimulus funds to increase broadband network access, particularly in rural and underserved and unserved areas.

CENIC (The Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California), together with its private sector partner CVIN (The Central Valley Independent Network, LLC), have put together a project plan designed to improve the availability of broadband networking infrastructure for 18 counties within the California Central Valley area. These counties are:

Amador, Calaveras, Colusa, El Dorado, Fresno, Kings, Kern, Mariposa, Merced, Madera, Nevada, Placer, Tuolumne, Tulare, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Sutter and Yuba

An application, the Central Valley Next Generation Broadband Infrastructure Project, was submitted to the NTIA (The National Telecommunications and Information Administration) on March 26 for ARRA stimulus funds to launch this project.

We believe the implementation of this robust network infrastructure can dramatically change the ways citizens in these 18 counties learn, work and live together. The funding of the application will also, in the short term, create jobs associated with network deployment and contribute to economic growth in the longer term.