Connie Stewart Case Study

Unlocking Rural Broadcast Access with Connie Stewart
Welcome back to this week’s episode of “Off the Cuff w. Rep. Huffman,” with special guest Connie Stewart, Executive Director of the California Center for Rural Policy at Humboldt State University.
We are going to be discussing rural broadband policy and access in my district, where some fifty-percent of my constituents do not have full access to broadband internet.
Many of us take for granted access to the internet, forgetting that there are many, even within the United States who do not have access to broadband internet. This lack of access hampers education, small businesses, emergency services, local economies, and technological development, not to mention the very access to the wealth

2425), is slated for markup in the House Committee on Natural Resources next week and seeks to address these glaring disparities.
First, we’ll hear from our special guest, Connie Stewart on the effects of insufficient broadband access in my district and nationwide, then we’ll move to what my bill can do to help mitigate these issues and bring broadband internet to constituents in my district, and to thousands of rural communities nationwide. Then we’ll pivot to discuss some of the other challenges and opportunities for our district and close with one of my favorite segments, answering a few questions from our office’s summer interns.
For those of you who don’t know her, Connie Stewart is a former Mayor of Arcata, and was also recently named Humboldt County Woman of the Year and we’re very excited to have her.
Fittingly for this discussion, Connie Stewart has worked for years and seen firsthand the effects of internet access expansion in Humboldt County first as a staffer for former Assemblymember Patty Berg and now as Executive Director of the California Center for Rural Policy at Humboldt State University.
Have a question? Please send it to [e-mail] and you can hear me answer on a future episode of “Off the Cuff with Rep. Huffman.”

Hope you