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Delays to BEAD pressured a Louisiana broadband building agency to layoff 80% of subcontractors, in response to the organisation’s co-owner
This text was initially revealed by Brad Randall, Editor of our sister publication, Broadband Communities
A broadband building agency in rural Louisiana has been pressured into layoffs as a result of BEAD delays, in response to Josh Etheridge, the co-owner of EPC.
Etheridge, who based EPC along with his brother eight years in the past, is the newest Louisiana enterprise chief to sound the alarm on delays to BEAD, the nation’s huge $42.45 billion effort to deploy broadband to all People.
In a brand new letter, addressed to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, Etheridge mentioned EPC was able to put boots on the bottom to start BEAD deployments on January 25.
Learn Etheridge’s letter to Lutnick right here
“However now? The market is frozen,” Etheridge wrote. “I’ve needed to launch 80% of our subcontractors. We’ve paused philanthropic giving, scaled again our chamber memberships, and sadly begun to make layoffs of our full-time workers.”
Because it was based, EPC has grown to incorporate greater than 160 full time workers, Etheridge wrote. Moreover, he mentioned the corporate had constructed a community of greater than 150 subcontractors.
Now, Etheridge says even North Louisiana-based EPC’s at-risk capital builds are “pulling again.”
“We had been poised for 300% progress,” he wrote. “We ready accordingly. And now—we wait.”
Etheridge’s letter, given to Broadband Communities on Monday, calls on the administration to not let “forms unravel all the pieces we’ve constructed.”
“If this continues, you’ll have successfully weaponized an amazing ambition—meant to elevate up and remodel rural America—in opposition to the very individuals who consider on this administration,” his letter continued. “We supported our newly elected leaders— with our cash, our phrases, and our votes — believing you’ll assist us in return.”
‘And now? We hear nothing’
Louisiana has been extremely impacted by an ongoing evaluate to the Broadband Fairness, Entry, and Deployment (BEAD) Program known as by Lutnick.
In 2024, Louisiana notably grew to become the primary to award BEAD funds by way of a state program known as GUMBO 2.0 (Granting Unserved Municipalities Broadband Alternatives).
It was additionally the primary state to realize approval for his or her preliminary BEAD proposal.
Now, Etheridge’s letter to Lutnick is the newest from a Louisiana government that warns about dire impacts from Lutnick’s BEAD delay.
With the letter, Etheridge now joins the CEO of Louisiana-based SkyRider Communications and David Herring, the founder and CEO of ClearPath Fiber, as the newest firm leaders sounding the alarm.
In keeping with Etheridge, if the silence continues “it is going to say what no phrases ever might.”
“That we had been by no means actually understood, that our sacrifice was by no means actually valued, and that our votes and voices mattered solely when it was time to depend them — not when it got here time to honor them,” he wrote.
Like Herring’s letter final week, Etheridge stresses that Louisiana “did it proper.”
He mentioned his firm “adopted the principles and “ran a clear course of.”
“No DEI mandates. Forty % underneath price range. Tech-neutral. No labor strings,” he mentioned.
Etheridge’s letter to Lutnick ends with the EPC co-founder telling Lutnick that “it’s not too late.”
He calls on Lutnick to “let Louisiana transfer ahead.”
“Let EPC construct. Let our individuals work,” he wrote. “Don’t let one other era lose religion within the guarantees we had been raised to consider in. We’re nonetheless prepared. We’re nonetheless prepared.”
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