In the past year, the Board has approved well over $3 million of federal CARES Act money and other state grants for the expansion of broadband to more than 1,400 homes and businesses across the County. And, just this past week, the County and Lumos were awarded another $1.3 million from the state to add 548 more fiber-to-the-home connections. When all of these projects are built out, more than 85% of the County will have access to broadband. This is a huge accomplishment, and I thank the Botetourt Broadband Commission, County staff, and all of our public and private partners for getting us to this point. We still have a long way to go to get to 100% coverage, but we are pointing in the right direction. And, speaking of the CARES Act, our efforts to strategically use that money to better the community became a central focus in 2020. While nearly every part of County operations benefitted in some way,
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