New Mexico Agency Recommends Keeping State USF the Same
New Mexico legislators shouldn’t tweak state USF structure, size or purposes, the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission recommended in a report sent to the legislature Friday. “No need” to raise the $30 million cap, which sufficiently covers current demands and…
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possible future increases, the agency said in docket 19-00046-UT. “The Commission’s focus at this time is on increasing participation in the fund, particularly the participation of small, rural carriers, as the Commission does not believe that the fund is currently meeting their needs as well as it could.” The agency is mulling a rule change “to increase the number of applications that it receives for Broadband Program support,” including by “potentially decreasing or eliminating the 25% per-project matching amount that the Commission currently requires program awardees to fund from their own pockets.” The PRC may need to do outreach to small rural carriers “who simply may lack the resources to design projects and applications for broadband funding though the areas they serve are in need,” it said. CTIA had urged the New Mexico agency not to recommend USF changes (see 1911010022).