Minnesota's Broadband Future

The State of Minnesota faces a soaring $1.2 billion deficit. Projects costing hundreds of millions of dollars seem like a tall order. As the state enters its legislative session this month, however, one such order awaits.

The Minnesota Ultra High-Speed Broadband Task Force convened in April 2008 to outline a path to statewide broadband access. The task force comprises 23 members from local and state government, education, health care, and telephone and cable companies.

In its Minnesota Ultra High-Speed Broadband Report, the task force establishes a goal of high-speed broadband access for 100 percent of Minnesota households by 2015 and makes recommendations to legislators on how to get there.

According to the task force report, the Federal Communications Commission defines broadband as 768 kilobits per second (Kbps) or faster. Under this categorization, approximately 94 percent of Minnesotans currently have access to broadband.

The task force recommends both getting service to that remaining 6 percent and enhancing state-wide broadband access to what it calls high speed—5–10 megabits per second (Mbps) upload and 10–20 Mbps download speeds. That’s roughly 15 times the 768 Kbps rate. By the task force’s definition, only 18 percent of Minnesotans have access to high-speed broadband, leaving 1.3 million households underserved.

According to Rick King, task force chair and CTO of Thomson Reuters North American Legal in Eagan, the task force’s minimum speeds are a practical measure. The task force asked, “By 2015, what are the types of applications that every Minnesotan needs to be able to use?” Two-way high-definition video was the defining application, as it plays a vital role in telecommuting, education, telemedicine, and other Internet services.

Leaders from the private sector agree. “The provider community has been less enamored with setting a goal for the sake of setting a goal, rather than making sure we have adequate speeds for the applications and uses that folks want,” says John Stanoch, task force member and Minnesota president of Qwest Communications.

King says the state’s economy can expect “multifold returns” by investing in the plan, equating more broadband with more jobs. Businesses with high-speed connectivity, he argues, have the upper hand. “We clearly want the state to be at an advantage as it recruits or seeks to retain businesses and expand them here in our state,” he says, adding that most businesses cite broadband access as a key factor in choosing a location.