SPRINGFIELD, Illinois, August 9, 2011 – It’s very easy to take broadband for granted. People want to go online to look up answers on Wikipedia, to watch movies on Netflix, to hang out on Facebook, or to Skype cousins across the globe — or across town.

None of this can be done without broadband. Higher and higher speeds of internet connectivity are necessary to satisfy everyone’s demand to do all of these things at once.

That’s where the Partnership for a Connected Illinois comes into play.

If it were a piece of classical music, the “study” by Navigant Economics’ Jeffrey Eisenach and Kevin Caves could easily be titled “Variations on a False Narrative in the key of F.” They claim, after a review of three (count ‘em, 3) of the hundreds of broadband grants, the broadband stimulus cost too much for too little ROI.

The most misleading of the claims, though, is the alleged $349,234 spent per un-served household. Well, I should say the $7 million per un-served household, but I’ll come back to that in a bit.

If you’re like most consumers today, you’re spending many hours a day online, surfing the Internet for information, sending and receiving e-mails, watching videos, exchanging photos, communicating on social networks, playing games, and shopping online. However, within the older adult community, age 65+, only a little over a third have adopted broadband and are able to go online at home.

With much of our information, entertainment, commerce, and even government services now on the Internet, our seniors have rapidly become the most digitally divided segment of our society – and with the great benefits the Internet has to offer our aging community, they’re missing out on an opportunity to improve their lives at a most critical point.

At MIO, we’re well aware that broadband isn’t being used to its full potential because not enough of the right people know what it is or what it can do for them. And since they don’t know what they’re missing, they’re not asking policymakers or the companies that provide broadband to make it more accessible. This is, in essence, the underlying problem that will perpetuate the digital divide.

Our nation’s goal is to decrease that divide: to help key decision-makers understand what broadband is and why they need it; encourage companies and policymakers to make it widely available; and help communities make the most of the opportunities it offers for economic development, increased quality and reach of services, and jobs.

Last year, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) recognized the role of technology in strengthening this country’s economy by investing 7.2 million in funding into technology and broadband adoption initiatives through the Broadband Technology Opportunity Program (BTOP). Through this funding the United States can build technology infrastructures and bring low-income residents online for the first time. However, technology in and of itself is not what is important. What is important is how people, families and communities use that technology to improve their lives. What will drive adoption and sustainability? Why will someone come online for the first time? What did we learn as an industry and society in bringing the first 100M on line that can help us in bringing the last 100M online? What is the real cost benefit analysis on people having access to information that directly impacts the way they manage their health, educate their children or plan for their financial future. I challenge all of us not to look at the cost of building these networks – but rather the cost of not building it.