Kalona Cooperative Telephone Company is getting almost $2 million dollars to expand fiber optic broadband service in Washington County.

KCTC General Manager Casey Peck says the “Empower Rural Broadband Grant” will help cover about 35% of the cost for a 5-year project to connect over 300 households to a future-proof fiber network. Peck says they were surprised to receive the full award of their grant application, “Our expectation was, alright we’ll try for it, but we may not get it all with only $4.5 million dollars throughout the whole state of Iowa, it seemed unrealistic that we get what we were asking for because that would be about 39% of the program grant dollars that were awarded and so, when we got, it was like a Christmas gift because we got word of it December 23rd so we had to be careful about saying anything about it until recently here.”

Peck says the pandemic has made the need for enhanced broadband service more important than ever. She says not only are faster internet speeds needed for downloading, but with more people doing work or school from home, faster upload speeds are necessary for programs like Zoom or telehealth meetings.