SB 149 sponsored by Senator Clay Scofield (R-Arab), received a favorable report last week in the Senate Committee on Fiscal Responsibility and Economic Development.

This bill would encourage private investment in broadband infrastructure through telecommunications companies, cable companies, and electric cooperatives in rural areas by creating the Alabama Rural Broadband Act to provide a nonrefundable, transferable income tax credit equal to 10 percent of the investment in new qualified broadband telecommunications network facilities in rural areas, subject to a cap. This bill would also provide a 10-year property tax exemption for new qualified broadband telecommunications network facilities in rural areas and an exemption from sales and use tax for equipment and materials used to operate any qualified broadband telecommunications network facilities.

SB 149 is pending final passage in the Senate.