Gabriella Novello

Education advocates and industry groups disagreed whether the FCC should allow retroactive reimbursements and set technology standards for schools and libraries in the $7.1 billion Emergency Connectivity Fund (see 2104140041). Replies were due Friday in docket 21-93. Schools that "made the decision earlier on to invest in connectivity for remote learning" should be reimbursed for purchases since the pandemic's onset, said Incompas. AT&T said retroactive payments would put schools that couldn't afford that at the "back of the line," a view echoed by the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society. Prioritizing retroactive reimbursements would help "most likely more well-off schools and libraries," said ACA Connects (see 2104120052): It "should only be allowed for eligible purchases that have not been funded by any other source." USTelecom and NTCA agreed. Reject calls to allow ECF funding for self-provisioning, said Verizon: "Because self-provisioning requires large upfront expenditures, the schools receiving" that support "would consume a disproportionate share of the ECF and leave too little support for other schools." WTA agreed: This would lead to "substantial delays in the availability of eligible services that are needed immediately." Self-provisioned networks are the "most cost-effective" for students without residential broadband, said groups including New America’s Open Technology Institute, the National Digital Inclusion Alliance, Center for Rural Strategies and Public Knowledge. Avoid minimum service standards because "there is no consensus on the appropriate capacity needed for remote learning," said the Wireless ISP Association: "To narrow the fund’s scope to include only those services offering certain broadband speeds could have the unintended consequence of penalizing students who live in areas" with slower speeds. NCTA and GCI Communication agreed. CTIA said questions about "adequacy of mobile broadband for remote learning are unsupported by the record and flatly contrary to the experience of millions of students during the pandemic." The Competitive Carriers Association, T-Mobile and UScellular said similar. Defining "connected device" should be done in a "flexible, technologically neutral way," said Apple.

The FCC's newest member lent his general support to the agency's thrust, following other recent supportive comments by Commissioner Brendan Carr (see 2104220036). The agency under acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel has been focused on "doing things that just need doing," said Commissioner Nathan Simington during a virtual FCBA keynote Friday. Rosenworcel is "really managing the agency effectively," Simington said: "If you look at our voting records since I've joined up, there's a lot of unanimous decisions." There's a "lot of work we can get done," he said, and "that's exactly what we've been doing all year."

The U.S. Department of Agriculture was asked to be more flexible on ReConnect, during a virtual listening session Tuesday. Consider changing more program loans to grants, said Yurok Tribe Council member Lana McCovey. "The repayment process would be hard to do." Akiak Technology CEO Kevin Hamer agreed: "The only way that we're going to get access as an unserved area is through infrastructure grants, not loans." Exclude low earth orbit satellites, Hamer said. Aleut Community of St. Paul Island Tribal Government Project Manager Dylan Conduzzi asked for reconsideration of satellite technology: "There are no other back-haul options available to us." Allow more flexibility in the grant application process, said Raymond Concho, Acoma Pueblo transportation planner. "We just don't have the matching funds, especially after the past year." Guiding principles from tribal leaders in recent months included requiring tribal government resolutions of support for broadband applicants, increasing flexibility for applicants, enabling tribal governments to serve their own lands, allowing tribes to certify whether they're served or underserved, and requiring compliance with tribal government regulations for all broadband recipients serving tribal lands, USDA staff said. Comments on eligibility requirements are due April 27 (see 2102260044).

The application filing window for the second round of the FCC’s COVID-19 telehealth program is scheduled to open at the end of the month (see 2104150036), but policy experts warn the evaluation metrics could cause healthcare providers and facilities in need to lose out on hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding.

In an interview scheduled to air Saturday on C-SPAN’s The Communicators, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr wouldn't say whether he supports acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel being nominated as the permanent chair. "I'm not sure my endorsement of a Democrat chair would help or hurt them at this point, so I'll refrain from weighing in on that," Carr said, "but it's been great having her reach across party lines and compromise." Carr said President Joe Biden's infrastructure package ignores the "billions of dollars that we already have in the pipeline to further close the digital divide." The FCC should be allowed time to disburse existing funds before additional funds are approved, he said (see 2104080059). The challenge is coordinating those efforts because "money at this point is not the problem," and it comes down to administering existing programs, Carr said. The commission's current broadband maps are also "outdated," he said, and "we can't take $100 billion without knowing where there is still a problem." Efforts to create broadband price regulation could disincentivize private investment, Carr said: "There's nothing that's going to scare those dollars away more quickly than the threat of rate regulation." There could be a lot of common ground on net neutrality if rate regulation is taken off the table, he said: "I'm still hopeful we can have an objective conversation." California's net neutrality law is "pretty remarkable," he said, and "an example of the real harms that come from those extreme approaches." Another pressing challenge is addressing the "spiraling" USF contribution factor, Carr said (see 2103230032). "I think that's an issue that is going to demand the attention of Congress in pretty short order." He also said the FCC made the "right call" in freeing up prime spectrum, and he's "very worried that there could be some backsliding with respect to those initiatives." Carr said he's still "very much open and interested" in Communications Decency Act Section 230 reform, citing Twitter's decision to block former President Donald Trump (see 2103300074). "The reasons that they articulated for kicking the president off the platform didn't really seem to line up with the actual tweets that they were referencing."

State telecom associations asked the FCC to reject some of the biggest winners’ long-form applications for the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction. The Minnesota Telecommunications Association, Iowa Communications Alliance and Wisconsin State Telecommunications Association want LTD Broadband’s application to be rejected, claiming the company is incapable of delivering the services it won bids on.

The FCC should do more to ensure a smooth rollout of its $3.2 billion emergency broadband benefit program, consumer advocates said in recent interviews (see 2102250066). The commission’s website isn’t sufficiently user-friendly, and it should be more transparent on when the program will actually start, they said. Others praised the FCC for the consumer outreach actions it has already taken.

The FCC’s Emergency Connectivity Fund was enthusiastically praised by education advocates, schools and broadband providers in comments posted Tuesday in docket 21-93. The ECF program will give schools and libraries $7.17 billion to support remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic (see 2103110037). Many suggested that the existing E-rate program is the best model for setting up the new funding as quickly as possible. Others questioned excluding smartphones from funding support.

Several state telecom associations want the FCC to review LTD Broadband's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction long-form application with increased scrutiny and, if necessary, reject it, in recent filings in docket 19-126. The Minnesota Telecom Alliance and Iowa Communications Alliance said there's "no indication that LTD has the technical, engineering, financial, operational, management, staff, or other resources" to meet the RDOF requirements for the locations it won in either state. If LTD can't prove otherwise, the commission should reject its long-form applications, the groups said. The Wisconsin State Telecommunications Association filed a similar request, saying LTD "will not be able to provide the requisite broadband service with the support it won in the RDOF auction." The company filed an opposition to MTA and ICA's petition, arguing the groups are part of an "off-key chorus of unsuccessful bidders disappointed in the outcome of the RDOF auction." LTD accused MTA and ICA of "pick[ing] out the winner of the largest amount of RDOF support and, relying on speculation, innuendo and surmise, call[ing] into question" its qualifications. "Attempts by some members of these rural ILEC associations to disparage LTD Broadband after failing to bid competitively in the reverse auction are transparently sour grapes," said LTD Broadband CEO Corey Hauer in an email. "This is not the FCC's first reverse auction nor is it the first time they have withstood criticism from angry mobs of losing bidders." LTD is "excited" to begin building rural fiber networks, Hauer said. "Demand for broadband is acute in these rural areas."

The FCC released an initial list Thursday of providers participating in the $3.2 billion emergency broadband benefit program (see 2103260047). Some big ISPs are on the list while others aren't, our review found. The commission plans to announce regular updates as more providers are approved, said a spokesperson. Among those participating so far are Cable One, Comcast, Consolidated Telephone and Windstream. AT&T and its affiliates, including BellSouth, Southwestern Bell and Pacific Bell, are also participating. Most providers will offer discounts for fixed broadband services. Several larger providers were notably missing from the list, including Frontier, Lumen, T-Mobile, UScellular, Tracfone, and Altice. It couldn't immediately be confirmed whether any of those companies' affiliates are participating. Most of the apparently missing companies didn't respond to questions about whether they plan to participate. A spokesperson for Lumen didn't answer our question about its participation but again said it's "reviewing the program's rules" (see 2103040049). Verizon, missing from the initial list, previously told us it will participate. Charter was approved to participate, but the company hasn't filed its confirmation yet. "We will do so shortly," emailed a spokesperson. A spokesperson for Altice said the company was approved to participate and is looking into why it was omitted from the list.