Orange County scores and player stats for Saturday, March 15

• March 15, 2025

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Scores and stats from Orange County games on Saturday, March 15

Click here for details about sending your team’s scores and stats to the Register.

The deadline for submitting information is 10:45 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 p.m. Saturday.

SATURDAY’S SCORES

BASEBALL

ANAHEIM LIONS SPRING BREAK TOURNAMENT

Cajon 3, El Toro 2

CRESTVIEW LEAGUE

Villa Park 2, El Modena 0

FREEWAY LEAGUE

Canyon 9, Crean Lutheran 0

PACIFIC COAST LEAGUE

Laguna Beach 4, Irvine 0

NONLEAGUE

Estancia 5, Colton 3

Savanna 12, Esperanza 2

Los Alamitos 5, Long Beach Wilson 3

Century 3, Calvary Chapel 1

Torrance 6, Capistrano Valley Christian 1

Rancho Bernardo 6, Mission Viejo 0

Trabuco Hills 5, Ontario Christian 0

Savanna 12, Esperanza 2

Orange 2, Tustin 1

GIRLS LACROSSE

NONLEAGUE

St. Margaret’s 19, Poway 9

BOYS VOLLEYBALL

DOS PUEBLOS SANTA BARBARA TOURNAMENT

Arroyo Grande def. Mission Viejo, 2-0

Mission Viejo def. Granada Hills Charter, 2-0

​ Orange County Register 

Whitney girls basketball blitzes Half Moon Bay early to claim first CIF state championship

• March 15, 2025

SACRAMENTO — A team that considers itself one of the hidden gems of the Southern California girls basketball scene stepped onto its biggest stage Saturday morning with a chance to make history.

Whitney seized its opportunity at the CIF State championships.

Behind a blistering start and tough rebounding, the undersized Wildcats captured their first state title in any sport by defeating Half Moon Bay 48-40 for an emotional victory in the Division IV final at Golden 1 Center.

As time expired, veteran assistant Wayne Muramatsu of Whitney held his fists high and hollered “We did it!” as the players rushed onto the court to celebrate the first state basketball title for the ABC Unified School District.

The secret was finally out on a program known for balancing under-the-radar play with high academics.

“We have been a hidden gem,” sixth-year Whitney coach Myron Jacobs said, “but we’ve been a decent team for actually the last five to six years. Whitney has always been around. We’re not a big school. We have a lot of girls up here who play volleyball, soccer.”

“We don’t take (transfers). It’s an academic school first, and the sports go second,” he added. “We’re not the biggest team but we play with a lot of heart. We play fast. We play discipline.”

Whitney (28-9) scored the first 10 points and never trailed in its first appearance in a state final.

RELATED: Sierra Canyon boys basketball proud of hard-fought win for state Division I title

Haylie Wang of Whitney helped seal the victory by driving from the top of the key past three defenders for a layup and 46-40 lead with about two minutes left in the fourth.

The versatile 5-foot-11 senior, who played in the post, point guard and guarded center Zoey Lemoge, had a team-high 17 points, nine rebounds and five assists. Sophomore Alyssa So added 15 points.

The 6-foot Lemoge finished with 18 points, 18 rebounds and two blocks for Half Moon Bay (23-8).

The Wildcats were slightly shorter than Half Moon Bay but signaled their intent to hit the offensive glass on the opening possession. Guard Rachel Moyher and forward Sarai Carter (nine rebounds, two blocks) grabbed offensive rebounds before Allie Yamaguchi sank a 3-pointer.

“Too many times they got the offensive board and got a good look out of it,” said Half Moon Bay coach Megan Smith, whose Cougars outrebounded Whitney 34-32.

Yamaguchi (eight points) highlighted the third period by banking in a 3-pointer to narrowly beat the shot clock.

Whitney reached its first state final after capturing the 605 League, a group that some consider “sneaky good” with contenders such as Pioneer and Cerritos.

Whitney was placed in Division 3A for the CIF-SS playoffs, a lower division than Pioneer (Division 2A) and Cerritos (Division 3AA). The Wildcats lost in the semifinals to Cantwell-Sacred Heart of Mary 41-36 but avenged the loss in the regional final with a 47-42 win.

Whitney’s program is fed by multiple youth leagues in the tight-knit Cerritos area. But the school’s identity remains academics.

“Any of our athletics is considered to be a bunch of nerds,” Muramatsu said while fighting back tears. “But what you see here in front of you are students and true athletes.”

​ Orange County Register 

Severely burned man rescued from garage fire in Santa Ana

• March 15, 2025

A man suffered severe burns after police helped him escape a garage fire early Saturday morning, Mar. 15, authorities said.

Firefighters responded to the blaze around 2:15 a.m. on the 800 block of South Flower Street, Orange County Fire Authority Capt. Sean Doran said.

Before fire crews arrived, Santa Ana police officers forced open the door of the detached, modified garage, where the fire was burning. Moments later, a man, severely burned, ran out of the structure.

Firefighters quickly extinguished the flames, preventing the fire from spreading to the house. The victim, whose identity was not released, was in critical condition at the scene, Doran said.

No updates were available later in the day.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

​ Orange County Register 

Civil rights icon Ruby Bridges to speak in Long Beach on Wednesday

• March 15, 2025

Ruby Bridges, who made history at age six when she walked into a grade school in Louisiana surrounded by federal marshals, is scheduled to speak Wednesday, March 19 at the Carpenter Center at Cal State Long Beach. Tickets to attend are $10.

In 1960, public education throughout the South was divided by longstanding tradition into separate schools for black and white students. Her walk into the William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans, on November 14, 1960, was the first-ever move to desegregate schools in America.

That same day, three other black students also attended formerly all-white schools in New Orleans, but Bridges was the only one to enroll on her own. Her mother accompanied her into the school, but they spent the first day in the principal’s office, due to the chaos.

During the era when civil rights came to the forefront of America, her journey to school that first day was met with an angry mob of white Southerners who shouted, catcalled and threw things. She walked in accompanied by four federal law enforcement officers. None of the white parents would allow their children to attend the school that day, and all but one teacher refused to show up for work.

Eventually, the students returned, but none of them was willing to share a classroom with her. Bridges was taught in a classroom by herself by teacher Barbara Henry all year long.

The child’s bravery in the face of such opposition inspired Norman Rockwell’s painting “The Problem We All Live With,” a book by Robert Coles and a Disney movie, among other tributes. Since then, Bridges has become an inspirational speaker and icon of the Civil Rights movement.

General admission tickets to hear Bridges speak are $10 and can be purchased online, three tickets maximum per person. Doors open at 6 p.m. The evening begins at 7 p.m. No backpacks are allowed. There is a fee to park at the Richard & Karen Carpenter Performing Arts Center, which is located at 6200 E Atherton St. Long Beach.  (562) 985-7000

On Instagram: instagram.com/csulbasi/reel/DHB6AENMi6L/

Learn more: tix.com/ticket-sales/carpenterarts/6773/event/1418406

​ Orange County Register 

Lakers look to get well and get over winless road trip

• March 15, 2025

DENVER — With a short-handed version of his team coming off a blowout road loss to the Milwaukee Bucks on Thursday night, the third defeat of an eventual winless four-game road trip, Lakers coach JJ Redick entered the visiting team’s locker room at Fiserv Forum looking to provide perspective.

“When he walked in, he was like, ‘Everything was good a week ago,’” Lakers guard Austin Reaves said. “We was playing good basketball, we had won eight straight. And we’ve had some bad luck with injuries and stuff. People that are even playing still banged up a little bit.

“But like I said, nobody feels sorry for us. So we gotta figure out a way to not let that happen and go compete in games. There’s no easy way around it. You just gotta figure it out. We don’t really have room for error.”

Redick clarified that he was making his second reference of the season to “A Week Ago” by Jay-Z.

“I’m a little upset at Austin – I thought I would get a little more street cred,” Redick quipped ahead of Friday’s trip-closing loss to the Denver Nuggets. “I said to somebody [Thursday] night, I know you guys see sometimes in game and it goes viral, me yelling at Dalton [Knecht] because he doesn’t know his own play. But one of my strengths is the ability to properly react to things. And I’m not perfect with that, but I’m pretty good at it … being able to see the bigger picture and being able to contextualize things.”

The context of the Lakers’ four-game losing streak, which is their longest drought of the season, is that they were without their starting frontcourt for nearly the entire trip.

Rui Hachimura (left patellar tendinopathy) and center Jaxson Hayes (bruised right knee) missed the entire trip, with Hachimura being sidelined for the past eight games.

LeBron James suffered a strained left groin late in the trip-opening loss to the Boston Celtics on March 8, sitting out the last three games.

Luka Doncic (sprained right ankle/left calf injury management), guard Gabe Vincent (left knee injury management) and forward Dorian Finney-Smith (left ankle injury management) also didn’t play in Friday’s game in which the depleted Lakers nearly stunned the Nuggets.

The Lakers’ injured players (James, Hachimura, Hayes and Maxi Kleber) flew back to Southern California between Monday’s loss to the Brooklyn Nets and the loss to the Bucks.

Redick expects the Lakers to get some players back during their compact homestand with five games in seven days.

The Lakers will play a pair of back-to-back sets with matchups against the Phoenix Suns (Sunday afternoon) and San Antonio Spurs (Monday night), rematches against the Nuggets (Wednesday night) and Bucks (Thursday night) before playing the Chicago Bulls on Saturday evening.

“I would assume at some point in the next three days to a week,” Redick said, “if not a little bit longer than that for one guy, I think they’re all very close to returning.”

But the bigger picture – and the goal of making the playoffs – is still being kept at the forefront.

The Lakers (40-25) dropped from the No. 2 spot in the Western Conference standings to No. 5 after their winless trip.

They entered the weekend two games behind the No. 2 Nuggets, and a game behind the No. 3 Houston Rockets and No. 4 Memphis Grizzlies.

The Lakers still had a 2½-game cushion over the Golden State Warriors for No. 6 and Minnesota Timberwolves for No. 7, but those teams have closed the gap over the past week with their winning streaks and the Lakers’ losing streak.

“We gotta figure out a way to get in the playoffs and that’s my focus,” Redick said. “We realize we need to get more wins to be in the playoffs.”

SUNS AT LAKERS

When: Sunday, 12:30 p.m.

Where: Crypto.com Arena

TV/radio: KABC (Ch. 7)/710 AM

​ Orange County Register 

Trump invokes 18th century law to declare invasion by gangs and speed deportations

• March 15, 2025

By NICHOLAS RICCARDI and WILL WEISSERT, Associated Press

Claiming the United States was being invaded by a Venezuelan gang, President Donald Trump on Saturday invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a sweeping war time authority that allows the president broader leeway on policy and executive action to speed up mass deportations of people — potentially pushing his promised crackdown on immigration into higher gear.

Trump’s declaration targets Tren de Aragua, contending it is a hostile force acting at the behest of Venezuela’s government. The declaration comes the same day that a federal judge in Washington barred the administration from deporting five Venezuelans under the expected order, a hint at the legal battle brewing over Trump’s move. The judge was scheduled to consider expanding the prohibition on deportation just minutes after Trump’s afternoon announcement.

“Over the years, Venezuelan national and local authorities have ceded ever-greater control over their territories to transnational criminal organizations, including TdA,” Trump’s statement reads. “The result is a hybrid criminal state that is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States, and which poses a substantial danger to the United States.”

The act was last used as part of the internment of Japanese-American civilians during World War II and has only been used two other times in American history, during World War I and the War of 1812. Trump argued in his declaration that it is justified because he contends the Tren de Aragua gang, a common talking point on the campaign trail, has ties to the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Trump talked about using the act during his presidential campaign, and immigration groups were braced for it. That led to Saturday’s unusual lawsuit, filed before Trump’s declaration even became public. The suit by the American Civil Liberties Union and Democracy Forward on behalf of five Venezuelans whose cases suddenly moved towards deportation in recent hours.

James E. Boasberg, chief judge of the D.C. Circuit, agreed to implement a temporary restraining order preventing the deportation for 14 days under the act of the five Venezuelans who are already in immigration custody and believed they were being about to be deported. Boasberg said his order was “to preserve the status quo.” Boasberg scheduled a hearing for later in the afternoon to see if his order should be expanded to protect all Venezuelans in the United States.

Hours later, the Trump administration appealed the initial restraining order, contending that halting a presidential act before it has been announced would cripple the executive branch.

If the order were allowed to stand, “district courts would have license to enjoin virtually any urgent national-security action just upon receipt of a complaint,” the Justice Department wrote in its appeal.

It said district courts might then issue temporary restraining orders on actions such as drone strikes, sensitive intelligence operations, or terrorist captures or extraditions. The court “should halt that path in its tracks,” the department argued.

The unusual flurry of litigation highlights the controversy Act, which could give Trump vast power to deport people in the country illegally. It could let him bypass some protections of normal criminal and immigration law to swiftly deport those his administration contends are members of the gang.

The White House has already designated Tren de Aragua a terrorist organization and is preparing to move about 300 people it identifies as members of the gang to detention in El Salvador.

​ Orange County Register 

Ducks get another crack at Cam Fowler and the Blues

• March 15, 2025

The Ducks traveled to St. Louis for Sunday’s meeting with the Blues, one of three teams they trail for the West’s final playoff berth that they will confront head-to-head down the home stretch.

They’ll also square off with the Calgary Flames and Vancouver Canucks in consecutive games on April 3 and April 5 before facing Calgary again April 9, with each of those four matchups presenting a four-point opportunity.

After pulling out a low-wattage 2-1 win over the Nashville Predators on Friday, their third game in four nights following back-to-back losses to Washington and Utah, the Ducks were six points behind Calgary. Utah, Vancouver and St. Louis were all stuffed in between the Ducks and Flames in a five-horse race for the final wild-card berth.

“We’ve been working all year to play meaningful games and it’s been kind of a tough stretch the last week, so we’re just trying to get back on that side of things,” said winger Troy Terry, who scored against Nashville. “Those are the games that we were on the wrong side of last year.”

It was a match in which Terry and ccoach Greg Cronin both said that fatigue was evident from its outset, though thankfully a rested Lukáš Dostál – he had the night off in Utah – answered the bell with 27 of 28 saves.

“It was pretty obvious from the start. We’re pretty fortunate to have some outstanding goaltending here. We just seemed sloppy. We weren’t executing with passes, we seemed a little disjointed,” said Terry, who called the Ducks’ win without their “A” game a sign of maturity for the club.

In St. Louis, they’ll run into a familiar face in Cam Fowler, who played nearly 1,000 games for the Ducks before being traded to the Blues earlier this season, and a familiar foe, one that’s beaten them in both prior confrontations this season.

The Blues rolled 6-2 on Jan. 9 in St. Louis, the first meeting after Fowler’s departure from Anaheim, and then withstood a feverish push in the final three minutes from the Ducks on March 7 at Honda Center, where Mason McTavish’s tying goal came at most a second after the final horn.

Since that game, the Blues slipped in overtime against the Kings, a game in which they showed their own weary legs at times before allowing a goal before a minute of the extra session had passed, and then lost 5-3 to the Penguins in Pittsburgh. They’ll have played Saturday in Minnesota before returning to host the Ducks.

Leading scorer Robert Thomas snapped an 11-game point streak in the March matchup but tallied twice in January’s clash. Fowler has been reinvigorated, racking up 21 points in 35 games as a Blue after collecting just four in 17 appearances with the Ducks to begin his campaign. That included three assists in his first two games opposing the Ducks.

Ducks at St. Louis

When: 3 p.m. Sunday

Where: Enterprise Center, St. Louis

TV/radio: Victory+, KCOP (Ch. 13)

​ Orange County Register 

Millions in US live in places where doctors don’t practice and telehealth doesn’t reach

• March 15, 2025

By Sarah Jane Tribble and Holly K. Hacker, KFF Health News

BOLIGEE, Ala. — Green lights flickered on the wireless router in Barbara Williams’ kitchen. Just one bar lit up — a weak signal connecting her to the world beyond her home in the Alabama Black Belt.

Next to the router sat medications, vitamin D pills, and Williams’ blood glucose monitor kit.

“I haven’t used that thing in a month or so,” said Williams, 72, waving toward the kit. Diagnosed with diabetes more than six years ago, she has developed nerve pain from neuropathy in both legs.

Williams is one of nearly 3 million Americans who live in mostly rural counties that lack both health care and reliable high-speed internet, according to an analysis by KFF Health News, which showed that these people tend to live sicker and die younger than others in America.

Compared with those in other regions, patients across the rural South, Appalachia, and remote West are most often unable to make a video call to their doctor or log into their patient portals. Both are essential ways to participate in the U.S. medical system. And Williams is among those who can do neither.

This year, more than $42 billion allocated in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is expected to begin flowing to states as part of a national “Internet for All” initiative launched by the Biden administration. But the program faces uncertainty after Commerce Department Secretary Howard Lutnick last week announced a “rigorous review” asserting that the previous administration’s approach was full of “woke mandates.”

High rates of chronic illness and historical inequities are hallmarks of many of the more than 200 U.S. counties with poor services that KFF Health News identified. Dozens of doctors, academics, and advocates interviewed for this article unanimously agreed that limited internet service hinders medical care and access.

Without fast, reliable broadband, “all we’re going to do is widen health care disparities within telemedicine,” said Rashmi Mullur, an endocrinologist and chief of telehealth at VA Greater Los Angeles. Patients with diabetes who also use telemedicine are more likely to get care and control their blood sugar, Mullur found.

Diabetes requires constant management. Left untreated, uncontrolled blood sugar can cause blindness, kidney failure, nerve damage, and eventually death.

Williams, who sees a nurse practitioner at the county hospital in the next town, said she is not interested in using remote patient monitoring or video calls.

“I know how my sugar affects me,” Williams said. “I get a headache if it’s too high.” She gets weaker when it’s down, she said, and always carries snacks like crackers or peppermints.

Williams said she could even drink a soda pop — orange, grape — when her sugar is low but would not drink one when she felt it was high because she would get “kind of goozie-woozy.”

‘This Is America’

Connectivity dead zones persist in American life despite at least $115 billion lawmakers have thrown toward fixing the inequities. Federal broadband efforts are fragmented and overlapping, with more than 133 funding programs administered by 15 agencies, according to a 2023 federal report.

“This is America. It’s not supposed to be this way,” said Karthik Ganesh, chief executive of Tampa, Florida-based OnMed, a telehealth company that in September installed a walk-in booth at the Boligee Community Center about 10 minutes from Williams’ home. Residents can call up free life-size video consultations with an OnMed health care provider and use equipment to check their weight and blood pressure.

OnMed, which partnered with local universities and the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, relies on SpaceX’s Starlink to provide a high-speed connection in lieu of other options.

A short drive from the community center, beyond Boligee’s Main Street with its deserted buildings and an empty railroad depot and down a long gravel drive, is the 22-acre property where Williams lives.

Last fall, Williams washed a dish in her kitchen, with its unforgiving linoleum-topped concrete floors. A few months earlier, she said, a man at the community center signed her up for “diabetic shoes” to help with her sore feet. They never arrived.

As Williams spoke, steam rose from a pot of boiling potatoes on the stove. Another pan sizzled with hamburger steak. And on a back burner simmered a mix of Velveeta cheese, diced tomatoes, and peppers.

She spent years on her feet as head cook at a diner in Cleveland, Ohio. The oldest of nine, Williams returned to her family home in Greene County more than 20 years ago to care for her mother and a sister, who both died from cancer in the back bedroom where she now sleeps.

Williams looked out a window and recalled when the landscape was covered in cotton that she once helped pick. Now three houses stand in a carefully tended clearing surrounded by tall trees. One belongs to a brother and the other to a sister who drives with her daily to the community center for exercise, prayers, and friendship with other seniors.

All the surviving siblings, Williams said, have diabetes. “I don’t know how we became diabetic,” she said. Neither of their parents had been diagnosed with the illness.

In Greene County, an estimated quarter of adults have diabetes — twice the national average. The county, which has about 7,600 residents, also has among the nation’s highest rates for several chronic diseases such as high blood pressure, stroke, and obesity, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data shows.

The county’s population is predominately Black. The federal CDC reports that Black Americans are more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes and are 40% more likely than their white counterparts to die from the condition. And in the South, rural Black residents are more likely to lack home internet access, according to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington-based think tank.

To identify counties most lacking in reliable broadband and health care providers, KFF Health News used data from the Federal Communications Commission and George Washington University’s Mullan Institute for Health Workforce Equity. Reporters also analyzed U.S. Census Bureau, CDC, and other data to understand the health status and demographics of those counties.

The analysis confirms that internet and care gaps are “hitting areas of extreme poverty and high social vulnerability,” said Clese Erikson, deputy director of the health workforce research center at the Mullan Institute.

Digital haves vs. have-nots

Just over half of homes in Greene County have access to reliable high-speed internet — among the lowest rates in the nation. Greene County also has some of the country’s poorest residents, with a median household income of about $31,500. Average life expectancy is less than 72 years, below the national average.

By contrast, the KFF Health News analysis found that counties with the highest rates of internet access and health care providers correlated with higher life expectancy, less chronic disease, and key lifestyle factors such as higher incomes and education levels.

One of those is Howard County, Maryland, between Baltimore and Washington, D.C., where nearly all homes can connect to fast, reliable internet. The median household income is about $147,000 and average life expectancy is more than 82 years — a decade longer than in Greene County. A much smaller share of residents live with chronic conditions such as diabetes.

One is 78-year-old Sam Wilderson, a retired electrical engineer who has managed his Type 2 diabetes for more than a decade. He has fiber-optic internet at his home, which is a few miles from a cafe he dines at every week after Bible study. On a recent day, the cafe had a guest Wi-Fi download speed of 104 megabits per second and a 148 Mbps upload speed. The speeds are fast enough for remote workers to reliably take video calls.

Americans are demanding more speed than ever before. Most households have multiple devices — televisions, computers, gaming systems, doorbells — in addition to phones that can take up bandwidth. The more devices connected, the higher minimum speeds are needed to keep everything running smoothly.

To meet increasing needs, federal regulators updated the definition of broadband last year, establishing standard speeds of 100/20 Mbps. Those speeds are typically enough for several users to stream, browse, download, and play games at the same time.

Christopher Ali, professor of telecommunications at Penn State, recommends minimum standard speeds of 100/100 Mbps. While download speeds enable consumption, such as streaming or shopping, fast upload speeds are necessary to participate in video calls, say, for work or telehealth.

At the cafe in Howard County, on a chilly morning last fall, Wilderson ordered a glass of white wine and his usual: three-seeded bread with spinach, goat cheese, smoked salmon, and over-easy eggs. After eating, Wilderson held up his wrist: “This watch allows me to track my diabetes without pricking my finger.”

Wilderson said he works with his doctors, feels young, and expects to live well into his 90s, just as his father and grandfather did.

Telehealth is crucial for people in areas with few or no medical providers, said Ry Marcattilio, an associate director of research at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. The national research and advocacy group works with communities on broadband access and reviewed KFF Health News’ findings.

High-speed internet makes it easier to use video visits for medical checkups, which most patients with diabetes need every three months.

Being connected “can make a huge difference in diabetes outcomes,” said Nestoras Mathioudakis, an endocrinologist and co-medical director of Johns Hopkins Medicine Diabetes & Education Program, who treats patients in Howard County.

Paying more for less

At Williams’ home in Alabama, pictures of her siblings and their kids cover the walls of the hallway and living room. A large, wood-framed image of Jesus at the Last Supper with his disciples hangs over her kitchen table.

Williams sat down as her pots simmered and sizzled. She wasn’t feeling quite right. “I had a glass of orange juice and a bag of potato chips, and I knew that wasn’t enough for breakfast, but I was cooking,” Williams said.

Every night Williams takes a pill to control her diabetes. In the morning, if she feels as if her sugar is dropping, she knows she needs to eat. So, that morning, she left the room to grab a peppermint, walking by the flickering wireless router.

The router’s download and upload speeds were 0.03/0.05 Mbps, nearly unusable by modern standards. Williams’ connection on her house phone can sound scratchy, and when she connects her cellphone to the router, it does not always work. Most days it’s just good enough for her to read a daily devotional website and check Facebook, though the stories don’t always load.

Rural residents like Williams paid nearly $13 more a month on average in late 2020 for slow internet connections than those in urban areas, according to Brian Whitacre, an agricultural economics professor at Oklahoma State University.

“You’re more likely to have competition in an urban area,” Whitacre said.

In rural Alabama, cellphone and internet options are limited. Williams pays $51.28 a month to her wireless provider, Ring Planet, which did not respond to calls and emails.

In Howard County, Maryland, national fiber-optic broadband provider Verizon Communications faces competition from Comcast, a hybrid fiber-optic and cable provider. Verizon advertises a home internet plan promising speeds of 300/300 Mbps starting at $35 a month for its existing mobile customers. The company also offers a discounted price as low as $20 a month for customers who participate in certain federal assistance programs.

“Internet service providers look at the economics of going into some of these communities and there just isn’t enough purchasing power in their minds to warrant the investment,” said Ross DeVol, chief executive of Heartland Forward, a nonpartisan think tank based in Bentonville, Arkansas, that specializes in state and local economic development.

Conexon, a fiber-optic cable construction company, estimates it costs $25,000 per mile to build above-ground fiber lines on poles and $60,000 to $70,000 per mile to build underground.

Former President Joe Biden’s 2021 infrastructure law earmarked $65 billion with a goal of connecting all Americans to high-speed internet. Money was designated to establish digital equity programs and to help low-income customers pay their internet bills. The law also set aside tens of billions through the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program, known as BEAD, to connect homes and businesses.

That effort prioritizes fiber-optic connections, but federal regulators recently outlined guidance for alternative technologies, including low Earth orbit satellites like SpaceX’s Starlink service.

Funding the use of satellites in federal broadband programs has been controversial inside federal agencies. It has also been a sore point for Elon Musk, who is chief executive of SpaceX, which runs Starlink, and is a lead adviser to President Donald Trump.

After preliminary approval, a federal commission ruled that Starlink’s satellite system was “not reasonably capable” of offering reliable high speeds. Musk tweeted last year that the commission had “illegally revoked” money awarded under the agency’s Trump-era Rural Digital Opportunity Fund.

In February, Trump nominated Arielle Roth to lead the federal agency overseeing the infrastructure act’s BEAD program. Roth is telecommunications policy director for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Last year, she criticized the program’s emphasis on fiber and said it was beleaguered by a “woke social agenda” with too many regulations.

Commerce Secretary Lutnick last week said he will get rid of “burdensome regulations” and revamp the program to “take a tech-neutral approach.” Republicans echoed his positions during a U.S. House subcommittee hearing the same day.

When asked about potentially weakening the program’s required low-cost internet option, former National Telecommunications and Information Administration official Sarah Morris said such a change would build internet connections that people can’t afford. Essentially, she said, they would be “building bridges to nowhere, building networks to no one.”

‘That hurt’

Over a lunch of tortilla chips with the savory sauce that had been simmering on the stove, Williams said she hadn’t been getting regular checkups before her diabetes diagnosis.

“To tell you the truth, if I can get up and move and nothing is bothering me, I don’t go to the doctor,” Williams said. “I’m just being honest.”

Years ago, Williams recalled, “my head was hurting me so bad I had to just lay down. I couldn’t stand up, walk, or nothing. I’d get so dizzy.”

Williams thought it was her blood pressure, but the doctor checked for diabetes. “How did they know? I don’t know,” Williams said.

As lunch ended, she pulled out her glucose monitor. Williams connected the needle and wiped her finger with an alcohol pad. Then she pricked her finger.

“Oh,” Williams said, sucking air through her teeth. “That hurt.”

She placed the sample in the machine, and it quickly displayed a reading of 145 — a number, Williams said, that meant she needed to stop eating.

Here’s how KFF Health News did its analysis for the “Dead Zone” series, which pinpointed counties that lag behind the rest of the United States in access to broadband service and health care providers.

To identify “dead zones,” KFF Health News consulted two main data sources.

• The Federal Communications Commission National Broadband Map was used to identify broadband deserts as of June 2024. We used the FCC’s minimum speed standard of 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload, and followed its definition of reliable broadband: service accessible via wired (fiber optics, cable, DSL) or licensed fixed wireless technology. It’s the standard for grants awarded through the federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program, known as BEAD. The FCC data shows whether such service is available, and not necessarily whether households subscribe to it.
• Data from George Washington University’s Fitzhugh Mullan Institute for Health Workforce Equity was used to determine counties with health provider shortages. GWU’s data on primary care providers (family and internal medicine doctors, pediatricians, obstetricians and gynecologists, physician assistants, and nurse practitioners) reflects providers who serve at least one person enrolled in Medicaid. We used the most recent years available: 2020 for 44 states, and 2019 data for Texas. Five states — Delaware, Florida, Maine, Minnesota, and New Hampshire — were excluded from analysis because they lacked reliable data for either year.

GWU’s data for behavioral health providers reflects psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, therapists, and addiction medicine specialists, regardless of whether their patients receive Medicaid. We used data from 2021, the most recent year available.

We classified counties as “dead zones” if they met these criteria:

• Fewer than 70% of homes had access to fast, reliable broadband.
• They ranked in the bottom third of Medicaid primary care providers, defined as the number of Medicaid enrollees per provider.
• They ranked in the bottom third of behavioral health providers, defined as the number of residents per provider.

A total of 210 counties met those criteria. At the other extreme, we defined 203 counties as “most served” if they had the most residences with broadband access (at least 96.7%) and ranked in the top third of Medicaid primary care and behavioral health provider ratios.

We also compared the health outcomes and demographics of dead zone counties relative to others using several data sources:

• U.S. Census Bureau, for data on household income, education levels, and other demographics.
• County Health Rankings & Roadmaps, part of the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, for data on life expectancy and the percentage of residents living in rural areas.
• U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, for data on diabetes, high blood pressure, and other chronic health conditions.

©2025 KFF Health News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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