The state will receive a $2 million grant to help expand broadband Internet access in the state.

Gov. Beverly Perdue got news of the grant Monday in Washington from U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, said Perdue spokeswoman Chrissy Pearson. The money will come from federal stimulus dollars and is meant to help get broadband Internet access to rural and under-served areas.

"We all know how important broadband is to achieving many of the governor's goals, education in particular," Pearson said. "Where there's a home connected to the greater world and easier access to that kind of technology, the educational opportunities for the children and that family are greater."

The e-NC authority, a state initiative that seeks to connect all state residents to the Internet applied for the grant. The agency will get $1.6 million for mapping broadband availablility and another $434,000 for planning, according to U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan's office.

"This investment in North Carolina will help boost economic development in our rural communities and keep them vibrant," said Hagan, a Greensboro Democrat.

* North Carolina's air quality this summer was the best it's been in more than three decades — the combined result of environmental laws, balmy weather and the recession.

The N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources said Monday that the state had just six "code orange" days in which ground-level ozone levels exceeded federal clean air standards. That's the lowest number since some local governments began tracking air quality in the state in the early 1970s. In the summer of 2008, the state had 36 days of unhealthy ozone levels, and 66 the year before that.

The primary reason for the decline in ozone levels is lower emissions from coal-fired power plants and automobiles, according to DENR. The state's Clean Smokestacks Act of 2002 required the state's 14 coal-burning plants to cut ozone-forming emissions by three-fourths by 2012. Coal is used to generate more than half the state's electricity. (N&O)

* U.S. Rep, Howard Coble has some problems with a plan to open up a host of new Internet domain names.

Coble, a Greensboro Republican, co-wrote a letter to the nonprofit organization that oversees internate domains such as .com or .org.

Coble’s interest extends in large part from his work on intellectual property rights.

Among the concerns, companies with recognizable brand names worry they’ll have to rush into a new cyberspace land grab to avoid others from squatting on their trademarks. Home Depot, for example, may find itself not only needing to hold onto homedepot.com but names like home.depot. (GN-R)

* U.S. Sen. Richard Burr makes a cameo in a new ad from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, but he's not yet in the top spot.

* Liberal blogger Adam Linker notes that the state bid it's $8,000 contract for cauliflower but not the $100 million contract for the State Health Plan.

* The Independent Weekly notes that a bill prohibiting publicly owned Internet and cable services has been filed again.

* Conservative blogger Jeff Mixon takes issue with a bill to give free tuition at community colleges to recently released convicts.

Rep. Bill Faison hopes to expand rural Internet access this session.

The Durham Democrat, chair of the newly renamed Ways, Means and Broadband Connectivity committee, has introduced three bills that would help achieve that goal:

H.B. 135: Broadband Service Providers. Would allow phone companies to offer high-speed Internet access bundled with phone service in areas currently served by other phone companies.

H.B. 136: DOT/Fiber-Optic Cable. Would allow the N.C. Department of Transportation to open up its right-of-ways to allow companies to lay down fiber-optic cable for high-speed Internet service.

H.B. 157: Continue Study/Rural Internet Access. Would allow the joint legislative committee on rural Internet access to continue past the end of this session.

"This problem is going to require multiple solutions," he said.

U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge will push for the federal government to build new schools and expand rural Internet access.

As a newly appointed member of the House Ways and Means Committee, the Lillington Democrat will be in a key position to influence new infrastructure spending in Congress.

A former state schools superintendent, he argued that the federal government should spend more building schools, a task typically left to state and local government.

"I think you will see that as part of a broader package hopefully we will bring out early next year," he told Dome. "Number one, to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure from schools to roads to bridges to highways to water and sewer, but more importantly to put people back to work."

He also said he would push to extend fiber optic cable in rural America to boost Internet access.

"That really is the highway of the 21st century," he said. "Unless you have access to that highway in rural America, you really aren't able to get on the Interstate. It is critical that we (expand fiber optic cable) all across America. We did it in the '20s and '30s for telephones and rural electrification. I think the time has come now when we need to do the same thing for high-speed Internet."

Etheridge said he envisions public-private partnerships, but he did not yet have an opinion on what role the government should then play in providing Internet services.

Listen to a podcast with Etheridge here.

When the legislature returns to Raleigh in January, the Senate will take a bold technological leap into 1992.

For the first time, senators will be allowed to have laptops at their desks. They won't have e-mail or access to the Internet, but they can have laptops. The computers would allow Senators access to the information available on the legislature's Web site. Senate leader Marc Basnight changed a long-standing rule banning electronic devices.

"There's been some discussion for a while of allowing access to information by computer," said Schorr Johnson, a spokesman for Basnight. "There has also been the concern of the tradition of the Senate session and any disruption. This represents a compromise."

The laptops would allow Senators to find a statute or bill quickly. But they won't have much else (sorry, no Minesweeper or solitaire). Senators will have to request the machines, which will stay in the chamber. The computers will be refurbished from older laptops the legislature already owns, so the rule change won't cost taxpayers anything, Johnson said. The plan also means senators will likely be wrestling with computers that are long past their prime.

The House has no rule banning computers and laptops are common in the chamber. As far as Dome knows, there have been no reports of House members reading Perez Hilton during sessions.

Had anyone heard of webmasters ten years ago?

At a debate on the SAS Institute campus today, Beverly Perdue made a minor historical mistake while making a point about education and technology.

"Ten years ago, who of us in this room would have thought we would ever know what a webmaster is?" she asked, rhetorically.

Dome doesn't know about the 400 people in the audience, although we would think that given the surroundings they'd be a bit more tech-friendly than other audiences.

Anyway, as it turns out more than a few people would have heard of webmasters in 1998.

The first free Web browser was developed in 1993. Within a few years, webmasters had became common, and the International Webmasters Association was founded in 1996. And the word appears in the 2000 edition of the American Heritage Dictionary.

Andrew Brod argues building roads would help counter the recession.

In a column in the Greensboro News & Record, the director of UNC-Greensboro's Center for Business and Economic Research writes that a "comprehensive public works program" could help the state counter the recession.

He says issuing bonds to repair roads and bridges would "put people to work," while extending Internet service would help "the movement of ideas."

Rural Internet access in North Carolina is higher than in rural areas nationwide, and yet even here we lag behind the many industrialized countries whose broadband networks are superior to those in the United States, in terms of both access and speed. Redoubling the efforts and funding of e-NC would pay dividends well into the future.

The projects, Brod writes, would make North Carolina even more competitive and better able to withstand future economic downturns.

Hat Tip: Ed Cone 

* The Carolina Stompers have canceled their planned protest of the Vance Aycock Dinner, saying that Richard Moore's letter is enough for them. (AC-T)

* John Edwards laid off his chief media consultant, Marius Penczner, a month ago, but didn't tell anyone until now. Media consulting will now be done in house. (The Fix)

* Rep. Thomas Wright may have overbilled the state Department of Health and Human Services for travel; a legislative ethics committee's hearings are on hold. (WS-N)

* U.S. Rep. Virginia Foxx is co-sponsor of a bill that would permanently ban taxes on Internet access; others hope just to extend a moratorium. (Watauga Democrat)

Municipal WiFi is safe for now.

A bill that would have restricted local governments from offering Internet access to residents stalled out in committee Tuesday, according to a post by Mark Binker on Capital Beat:

The bill has been turned into a "study" bill, which is legislative speak for "We'll think about it and get back to you ... next year ... maybe."

The bill drew opposition from city leaders in Wilson and Morganton, which offer the service because local telecoms don't offer fast enough Internet access, as noted by Jordan Schrader on Capital Letters.

Google, which has proposed providing wireless access in San Francisco, even got in the act, writing a letter opposing the legislation.

Related: Mark Turner's cable modem is down; suspicion abounds.