New York Awards $13.1 Million In New Low Income Housing Broadband Grants

NY affordable housing complex in the Bronx

New York State officials have unveiled the first round of broadband deployment grants made possible by the state’s $100 million Affordable Housing Connectivity Program (AHCP), which aims to drive affordable fiber and Wi-Fi to low-income state residents trapped on the wrong side of the digital divide.

As part of the program, the state recently announced it will be spending $13.1 million to connect 14,167 lower income residents across Buffalo, Rochester, upper Manhattan and the Bronx with both affordable gigabit-capable fiber – and low cost Wi-Fi.

Flume, the partner ISP chosen by the state, will offer residents the choice of three broadband tiers: 100/20 megabit per second (Mbps) fiber for $10 per month, symmetrical 200 Mbps fiber for $15 per month, and symmetrical 1 gigabit per second (Gbps) fiber for $30 per month. All three subsidized fiber options will be locked at that price point until 2034, according to the state.

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Fox Hall affordable and senior living housing complex in Manhattan

“In today's digital age, access to reliable, affordable high-speed Internet isn't just about convenience – it's about ensuring every New Yorker can participate fully in our modern economy and society,” New York Governor Kathy Hochul said of the new grants. “Through these strategic investments, we're not only installing fiber and infrastructure, we're opening doors to education, healthcare and economic opportunity.”

Faster, Better, Cheaper

The first round of grants under the Affordable Housing Connectivity Program will allow Flume to expand its existing network in New York City to numerous lower income apartment complexes and public housing complexes. At the same time, Flume will bring its fiber optic service for the first time to the Buffalo and Rochester areas of upstate New York.

In New York City, Flume will spend $4.5 million to deploy roughly 13 miles of fiber, connecting 88 properties across the Bronx and several New York counties, encompassing 126 buildings and 4,854 individual housing units.

In the Finger Lakes Region of upstate New York (Monroe and Ontario counties), Flume will spend $3.9 million to deploy 12 miles of new fiber, ultimately serving 51 properties in the Rochester metro area, covering 305 buildings and 4,280 individual housing units.

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Kenfield Homes affordable housing complex in Buffalo

In the Buffalo region of Western New York state, Flume says it will spend $4.6 million to deploy 14 miles of new fiber.

That will be enough to connect 39 properties in the Buffalo metro area (Erie County), serving 349 buildings and 5,033 individual housing units.

Construction on all three projects will be complete and service will be available to all households by the end of 2026, officials estimate.

State officials also confirmed with ILSR that Flume – not the public – will own the infrastructure once completed, raising long-term questions about affordability once the 12-year price cap requirements expire.

Part Of A Bigger Plan

The Affordable Housing Connectivity Program, a partnership between Empire State Development's ConnectALL Office and New York State Homes and Community Renewal, has a broader plan to spend $100 million in grants to connect 100,000 low income homes across the state. The primary funding for the Program comes from the U.S. Treasury Department Capital Projects Fund, established under the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).

New York State has long struggled with affordable, reliable, and widely available broadband access thanks to a market heavily dominated by just two regional monopolies: Charter (Spectrum) and Verizon (FiOS). This lack of competition has long resulted in spotty coverage, high prices, slow speeds, connection unreliability, and substandard customer service.

Charter’s performance has been so problematic, the cable giant was almost kicked out of the state in 2018 after the company failed to meet broadband deployment deadlines affixed to its 2016 acquisition of Time Warner Cable, and repeatedly misled regulators as to the full coverage area of the company’s broadband network.

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NY Affordable Housing Connectivity Program Flyer

New York has been more active than many states in prioritizing broadband affordability.

During COVID, New York state took the unprecedented step (for the U.S.) of passing a law requiring ISPs to offer affordable broadband to low income families pegged at $15 for 25 Mbps, $20 for 200 Mbps. Despite significant lobbying pressure from the telecom industry to kill the law, it remains intact after the Supreme Court recently refused to hear the case.

The state is also getting a massive leg up on broadband expansion thanks to ARPA and the 2021 infrastructure bill, which are both infusing sagging NY broadband markets with some of the most substantive public subsidy funding in a generation.

That funding, in turn, is being used to power NY state’s broader $1 billion ConnectALL initiative.

ConnectALL technically has three components, beginning with the state’s $50 million Digital Equity Program, which funds digital literacy and digital job readiness education, facilitates access to affordable Internet and devices, enhances digital privacy and safety, and makes online government services more easily accessible.

The State’s $224 Million Municipal Infrastructure Program (MIP) was created to support municipal broadband projects, which have shown to be a viable, and increasingly popular, way to bring affordable, high-quality Internet service to traditionally neglected communities. The program’s ConnectALL Projects Dashboard provides details on projects funded to date by MIP.

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NY State regions

NY State’s ConnectALL Deployment Program was designed to fund broadband deployment at unserved and underserved locations.

ConnectALL released the program’s Request for Applications for approximately $644 million in December 2024.

That money relies on federal funding from the BEAD program, as is detailed in the original ConnectALL Broadband Deployment Initial Proposal.

All told, state broadband officials in New York are taking a different approach from that of many other states by making municipal broadband a cornerstone of its digital divide efforts.

What the Empire State is doing stands in contrast to states like Pennsylvania, where officials have taken the entirety of unprecedented federal grant money and dumped it in the lap of large regional monopolies with long histories of subsidy abuse.

With $664 million in BEAD funding waiting in the wings this year, New York State will have numerous additional opportunities to show that they’re interested in taking a more creative, community-focused approach to solving the state’s long standing digital divide.

Below you can watch a recording of an Affordable Housing Connectivity Program Virtual Forum for Property Owners held on January 30, 2024:

Remote video URL

Header image of affordable housing complex in the Bronx NY courtesy of Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International

Inline image of the Fox Hall affordable and senior living housing complex in Manhattan courtesy of Matt Green on Flickr, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic

Inline image of the Kenfiled Homes affordable housing complex in Buffalo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic

Inline image of Affordable Housing Connectivity Program flyer courtesy of NY ConnectALL website

Inline may of state regions courtesy of the state's BEAD Initial Proposal