Max Baucus: “Exactly. The State of Montana enacted the first broadband credit in the nation in 1999. It was the brainchild of one of…”

“Exactly. The State of Montana enacted the first broadband credit in the nation in 1999. It was the brainchild of one of our public utility commissioners, Bob Rowe, and of state senator Mignon Waterman and others in the legislature. It was in effect for only two years, I believe, before being temporarily suspended, along with a number of other tax breaks, due to the State's budget shortfall. But in the short time it was in effect, it had very positive results. I want to quote from an article by Bob Rowe in one of our State newspapers, The Missoulian, in June 2001, in which Bob was describing the effect of the Montana broadband credit: The results are impressive. Dozens of projects were awarded tax credits, most of them in rural Montana--places like Circle, Crow Agency, Superior and Big Timber. Projects included DSL, cable modems, and wireless. They also included projects to provide 'redundant' access that is critical to many technology businesses in case service goes out. Now as you might surmise, Circle, Montana is not a very big place. It had 644 people in the last census. None of those communities mentioned in that article has more than 1,600 people. If a broadband credit can help bring broadband to rural communities like those, then it is a worthy piece of legislation.…”