Almost every Nebraska home should have broadband connection by 2028 [Video]

LINCOLN — Nebraska is on track to reach a goal that once seemed impossible — connecting virtually every home, no matter how rural, to high-speed broadband by the end of 2028.

That’s what the Legislature’s Transportation and Telecommunications Committee was told Friday at an interim study hearing to monitor the status of broadband expansion in the state.

“It seems like a fairy tale because at one point it was,” said State Sen. Wendy DeBoer of Bennington, who introduced the study resolution. “I never thought that we would get this far, this fast. We never thought we would be able to get the money together.”

But speakers pointed to signs of progress in extending broadband across the state.

Patrick Haggerty, head of the Nebraska Broadband Office, said the state has finished identifying which areas and homes lack broadband service or have service slower than the state standard. He said his office …