Today, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) joined the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and over 80 other civil rights organizations in a letter to congressional leadership urging them to provide a low-income broadband benefit as part of the forthcoming Phase 4 COVID-19 Package.
Affordable broadband is critical to:
- Provide telehealth for everyone—particularly seniors and veterans. Patients and people with disabilities must have a reliable broadband service at home to take advantage of remote health care and the additional authorization for telehealth in the CARES Act.
- Ensure a more rapid end to the COVID-19 emergency. Broadband enables all people in the U.S. to more easily comply with national stay-at-home guidelines and local orders, which will mean a faster end to the outbreak.
- Fill the “homework gap.” Children and families stuck at home will be able to engage in distance learning and communication with schools. To be effective, high-speed broadband at home must meet the needs of a whole family and withstand intensive
network use.
- Economic security. Workers and small business owners need a quality broadband service to work from home or apply for emergency benefits.
With hundreds of millions of people in this country now at home in order to limit the spread of the coronavirus, it is in our country’s national interest to continue as much of our economic and civic life as possible during this time.
Read the full letter here.
