HOUSTON -- Natchez Trace EPA General Manager Shawn Edmondson said this week the electrical cooperative will receive a $10.3 million federal subsidy to help provide its service area in Webster and Chickasaw Counties with broadband internet access. Efforts to reach that goal are bearing fruit; the EPA has recently provided internet service about 150 customers, and that number is growing every day, Edmondson said. The subsidy to NT Spark is designed to help underwrite the estimated $42 million cost of broadband infrastructure construction in underserved parts of the Natchez Trace service area. The subsidy is part of $91 million approved for use by nine northeast Mississippi electric power companies for internet access, according to information from Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley.