Policy changes, technology limitations and problems in mapping data will all, in some way, limit the nation\u2019s ability to bring broadband to rural America, industry watchers said.<\/p>\n
The states that have invested in standing up broadband offices with highly qualified technical expertise and the administrative heft to develop strong public policy will likely be more successful at closing the digital divide, consultants said.<\/p>\n
New grant rules for the federal Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment<\/a> (BEAD) program which allow for low-Earth orbit<\/a> (LEO) satellite technology to be considered \u2014 and grant rules<\/a> where states are required to make their BEAD grants available to all broadband technologies as a form of price shopping \u2014 are setting the stage for millions of rural homes to have the appearance of being served by broadband, when in fact, they could be badly served or go without. (Examples of LEO tech include the Elon Musk-owned Starlink.)<\/p>\n \u201cPost-BEAD, there are going to be millions of households that will remain unserved and underserved. And really, in my mind, it\u2019s a bipartisan betrayal of rural America,\u201d Tom Reid<\/a>, president and founder of Reid Consulting Group, which partners with states and counties in broadband consulting, said during a Sept. 24 panel for Broadband Breakfast, a news and policy organization focused on broadband<\/a> technology. \u201cIt\u2019s just a really stunning failure of public policy.\u201d<\/p>\n Nationwide, 40 to 60 percent of locations \u201cthat should be eligible for BEAD are being gaslighted\u201d about its coverage potential, Reid said. LEO limitations include decreased effectiveness in areas with topography or tree coverage; it can have difficulty penetrating leaf cover and surmounting steep terrain.<\/p>\n Both the Biden and the Trump administrations have made it difficult to challenge the FCC maps with more accurate broadband coverage data, Reid said, indicating mapping data was consistently, deeply \u201cslanted toward the [Internet service providers] ISPs, giving them another opportunity to claim service in areas that are in fact not served.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI really think, at the end of all of this, after BEAD is finally awarded, we\u2019re still going to have millions of locations that were missed,\u201d Doug Dawson, president of CCG Consulting<\/a>, a telecommunications consulting firm, said during the panel. The reasons, he said, are many, starting with mapping data that offers an often inaccurate picture of unserved and underserved locations.<\/p>\n They use a \u201ctrust, but never verify, approach to mapping,\u201d Reid said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe frequently see fixed-wireless providers claiming total coverage within a fixed radius of their towers,\u201d Reid explained in a follow-up email. \u201cWe know it is not true, they know it is not true and the FCC knows it is not true.\u201d And successfully challenging a claim only reflects the lack of coverage at an individual address \u2014 not the surrounding area that may also be impacted.<\/p>\n The $42.5 billion federal BEAD program was a widely supported component of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act<\/a>. It is administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). The second Trump administration revamped key components of the Biden-era program, downplaying or eliminating certain provisions like the preference for fiber infrastructure<\/a>, and the kinds of equity programs that would help to bring broadband service into the homes of often economically disadvantaged residents.<\/p>\n Reid pointed to an area in western North Carolina, in Cherokee County, where Internet speed test data shows \u201ca few pockets of good service, but otherwise, pretty bad service.\u201d Internet service providers, he said, claim ample coverage in the county, disqualifying the areas from BEAD funding. The few locations still eligible for the BEAD \u201cwere all awarded to low-earth orbit satellite [service].\u201d<\/p>\n New broadband infrastructure in North Carolina funded via the American Rescue Plan Act tends to be projects installing fiber, which is more reliably fast and dependable compared to other technologies like fixed wireless or LEO. And the state does conduct \u201consite technical site visits\u201d to test the level of service, Angie Bailey, director of the Broadband Infrastructure Office at the North Carolina Department of Information Technology, said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think as we have more and more of our projects completed, and move into BEAD, that\u2019s a huge piece,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n North Carolina has questioned the federal maps, submitting about 40,000 \u201cfabric challenges\u201d in the last two years, Bailey said. The fabric<\/a> refers to the Internet serviceable locations.<\/p>\n \u201cThose locations themselves are still being refined. And so we\u2019ve spent a lot of time on fabric challenges. We\u2019ve gotten about 23,000 of those approved over the last couple of years,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s really important work to us. We have a really strong mapping team. Our state has the Center for Geographic Information and Analysis, which is part of our Department of IT.\u201d About 5,000 locations are still pending approval.<\/p>\n Minnesota has been involved with state-led broadband infrastructure for about the last dozen years, Bree Maki, executive director of the Office of Broadband Development, said \u2014 and this includes broadband mapping.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery time we do a state-funded project, we go out and we\u2019re checking every location we\u2019re funding and doing speed tests before we make any final payment. We\u2019re seeing the locations. We\u2019re seeing that they exist, and so then we update those maps,\u201d Maki said. But data on the FCC-provided maps used in the BEAD program was \u201cnot necessarily what we get from our vendor.\u201d<\/p>\n Some broadband offices, Dawson said, \u201care pushing the envelope; and some of them completely gave in to the NTIA rules.\u201d<\/p>\n States and the federal government have long recognized the essential need to expand fast, reliable Internet into rural America, efforts that have often come up short, industry and public-sector observers said. And if BEAD fails to close the digital divide gap, Reid said, rural America will pay the price.<\/p>\n \u201cI just really ask everybody to really realize what rural Americans are facing. In many cases, they don\u2019t have broadband. They don\u2019t have mobile service. And now the FCC has allowed copper abandonment without any notification,\u201d Reid said, referring to the commission\u2019s moves to smooth<\/a> the process for retiring copper lines. \u201cWe are literally stranding millions of Americans in the 1930s, in terms of communications perspective. And to me, that\u2019s just unconscionable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Policy changes, technology limitations and problems in mapping data will all, in some way, limit the nation\u2019s ability…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[1638,86,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-187523","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-internet","8":"tag-internet","9":"tag-technology","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}