PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) — One of Rhode Island’s top internet providers sued the McKee administration on Monday, accusing state officials of mismanaging the rollout of a $108 million plan for broadband expansion and relying on flawed data.
Company officials at Cox Communications, which filed the lawsuit in R.I. Superior Court, are asking a judge to block the R.I. Commerce Corp. from proceeding with the plan. They argue Rhode Island will otherwise waste the federal money — awarded by former Gov. Gina Raimondo’s U.S. Commerce Department — by building redundant broadband infrastructure.
Cox’s attorneys said in court documents that Commerce officials are also refusing to make public their underlying data, which they say would result in the state building “taxpayer-subsidized and duplicative high-speed broadband internet in affluent areas of Rhode Island like the Breakers Mansion in Newport and affluent areas of Westerly.”
“Rather than using taxpayer funds to ensure high-speed access to all Rhode Islanders — including low-income Rhode Islanders in need — the Commerce Corporation has devised a program that will benefit wealthy parts of the state already with high-speed internet,” the attorneys wrote in the complaint.