U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock were on hand Friday at a local fiber optics facility to announce a job expansion to increase broadband internet access in Georgia.
The Norcross-based firm OFS will add 100 jobs as part of the expansion, which was made possible by $1.3 billion in federal funding allocated to Georgia as part of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program within the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
“I’m so proud to be here today to celebrate our efforts to bridge the digital divide in Georgia by investing more than $1 billion in expanding broadband and strengthening access to affordable high-speed internet across the country,” Warnock said.
“We’re are truly grateful for the support that we’ve received to be a part of the expanding reach of global high-speed internet,” said Holly Huse, CEO and president of OFS.
“There are many among of us who still don’t have this access, and we are thrilled to be part of a team bringing healthcare, education and employment access to America,” she added.
Warnock and Raimondo toured the OFS facility trailed by a sea of business executives, media members and factory workers.
“I love getting [and] seeing the slicing and seeing the testing,” said Raimondo. “It’s unbelievable the pride that every one of these workers have in their work.”
Warnock said he was determined to make high-speed internet access across Georgia a reality after hearing stories of residents forced to go without it, particularly those in underserved and rural communities.
“Georgia is leading the country with respect to broadband internet access, which in a word is our lives,” he told WABE. “Broadband is to the 21st century as electricity was to the 20th.”
One attendee who agreed with Warnock’s sentiments was Ernestine Roger-Lightford, an Ellenwood resident who recently acquired high-speed internet after her husband’s cancer diagnosis.
She credits the access with changing the life of her and her family.
“Having high-speed internet, we can do telehealth at home instead of going to the doctor’s office … instead of [being] in the 285 traffic trying to get there,” Lightford said.
Raimondo thanked Huse and Warnock for ensuring that the demand for fiber optics will be filled in Georgia instead of being outsourced elsewhere.
She also credited President Joe Biden for what she called his mission to rebuild American manufacturing, referring to him as the “most pro-Union president in United States history.”
Biden, who signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act into law in 2021, will be in Atlanta on Sunday to give the commencement address at Morehouse College.
