• Case
  • The Fort Peck Indian Reservation is located near Fort Peck, Montana and is home to several federally recognized bands of Assiniboine, Nakota, Lakota, and Dakota Native Americans
  • Has been looking to build and strengthen broadband infrastructure to assist in distance learning, telehealth, and working from home as the internet is now a critical need during the pandemic
•  Funding/ Support
  • 2020: FCC granted digital sovereignty — ownership over their own spectrum
    •  will increase connectivity across our state’s tribal communities and increase access to critical health and education services
    • provides  up to 117.5 megahertz of 2.5 GHz band spectrum that can be used by tribes to connect their communities
    • FCC gave the tribe highly valuable wireless spectrum licenses for free, making it one of the first tribal-controlled wireless networks to come out of a Federal Communications Commission program
• Strategies for success 
  • Motivation
    • The tribe has been trying to gain funding and assistance for building broadband but has not been able to access assistance due to spread out territory, terrain, and funding required
    • The new federal tribal broadband fund has revitalized the tribe’s hopes allowing them to continue to push forward
      • The tribe is now working to finance and plan for 4 towers

Key Themes: Motivation – Roadblocks 

Issues: Territory – Funding – distance learning, telehealth

Strategies: Building Communication

Forms of Access: Towers – Everyone

Reference: http://www.fortpecktribes.org/departments.html