LINCOLN- While a heavily funded effort to bring high-speed internet to all of Nebraska ensues, a dispute over overlapping grants to expand broadband is being brought to court. The internet provider Pinpoint Communications has sued the Gage County Board for its recent choice to deny the company a permit to lay fiber optic cable. The board rejected the permit because they considered it a waste of tax funds to give another grant to an area that had already received money to implement broadband service.

The Gage County District Court accused the board of overstepping its authority when it denied the permit, which is usually approved without discussion. The overlap of funding involves 11 residences northeast of Beatrice, and potentially $200,000 or so in grants to serve the area. Gage County had previously hired another internet provider, NextLink, to extend broadband to rural and underserved sites through a county program, while Pinpoint obtained a $535,000 grant approved by the Public Service Commission through the state's program.

The lawsuit filed by Pinpoint is just the latest tiff in an ongoing dispute over a hypothetical overbuild of broadband internet. There has been a plethora of recent efforts from state and federal governments to bring high-speed internet to rural areas. Pinpoint holds that the county lacks the authority to reject their permit application.

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