WASHINGTON, D.C. — Last week President Barack Obama signed a memorandum starting the Broadband Opportunity Council, a group to unite over the goal of increasing broadband investment and adoption.

The Council is to be co-chaired by the federal secretaries of Commerce and Agriculture and include more than 25 government agencies, all with clear policy objectives. Those include engaging with industry and others to understand ways the government can better support the needs of communities seeking broadband investment; identify regulatory barriers unduly impeding broadband adoption or competition; and survey and report back on existing programs that currently support or could be modified to support greater broadband access.

The goal is to take action to remove the barriers. The Council is to report back to the President within 150 days on its progress. According to the statement from March 23, these actions will build upon several steps the federal government has already taken toward meeting these goals.

These include development of a common application form for wireless broadband providers to lease space for their rooftop antennas, sharing of best practices for “dig once” policies by state and municipal governments nationwide and offering new online tools for finding and leasing federal assets available for broadband networks.

In line with these goals, in February the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) took action independently against two of the 19 state laws that restrict communities from deciding what broadband solutions fit their needs. These states either flat out do not allow or place heavy restrictions on municipalities providing broadband internet access to their residents.

“This step forward helped unserved and underserved communities, many of whom have no way to be economically competitive absent a municipal provider of broadband,” it stated. “As a result, communities in two states, Tennessee and North Carolina, will no longer be held back from setting up municipal networks like successful examples in Chattanooga and Wilson, where those networks affordably deliver broadband speeds around 100 times the national average.”

On the same day last week, USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack announced funding for three rural telecommunications projects that are supposed to improve broadband service in portions of Arkansas, Iowa and New Mexico.

“These telecommunications providers will deliver enhanced broadband services to help attract and grow businesses, as well as to improve educational and health services,” he said. “Time and again, studies show that affordable broadband offers increased economic opportunities in rural areas, which is why Rural Development is committed to delivering high-speed internet service to these communities.”

Southwest Arkansas Telephone will receive a $25 million loan to upgrade portions of a fiber network and convert the remaining portions of a copper system to fiber to improve service for subscribers.

In New Mexico, Mescalero Apache Telecom will receive a $5.4 million loan to upgrade portions of its system and provide fiber service to approximately 50 percent of its territory.

This is the first loan that USDA’s Rural Utilities Service (RUS) has made under the so-called Substantially Underserved Trust Area provisions of the 2008 farm bill. These provisions amended the Rural Electrification Act of 1936 to make funding available to areas that historically have had problems receiving federal assistance.

RUS has held a series of outreach workshops around the country in the past year to help tribal communities access its broadband programs.

The third loan is to Iowa’s Minburn Communications, which will receive a $4.7 million loan to upgrade its copper network to fiber, and to provide subscribers with voice, broadband and video service.

That announcement amounted to a total of $35 million; in 2014, RUS awarded $228 million to improve telecommunications service for 83,000 rural customers. The administration also announced it had reached its goal of providing 98 percent of Americans with high-speed fourth-generation, or 4G, mobile broadband, based on newly released information from the FCC.