The Divide: North Dakota's broadband director on building the state's BEAD program

This episode features Brian Newby, broadband program director for the state of North Dakota. Newby joined the state's broadband office as it was in the process of being created in early 2023. Since then, his primary focus has been on developing the state's Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program. North Dakota is to receive $130.16 million through BEAD and, as of this writing, the state is awaiting NTIA approvals on both volumes of its BEAD proposals.

In this conversation, we dive deeper into North Dakota's remaining connectivity gaps, as well as details about the state's BEAD plan and forthcoming challenge process, how the state hopes to build a broadband deployment program that's "pro-carrier," what BEAD success ultimately looks like for North Dakotans – and more. 

And if you happen to be a job-seeking, broadband-loving North Dakotan (or thereabouts, regionally), you can apply here to help with all of this as the state's broadband program manager.

Here are a few topics covered in this conversation:

For a lightly edited conversation transcript, click the caption button on the player above.