Citing a desire to “remove unnecessary rules and mandates, to improve efficiency, take a more technology-neutral approach, cut unnecessary red tape, and streamline deployment,” the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has announced a 90 day “programmatic waiver” — an extension — to the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program Final Proposal deadlines.
“The Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information has determined that Eligible Entities will need additional time to implement the forthcoming programmatic improvements,” the NTIA BEAD extension reads.
“Therefore, the extraordinary circumstances exist that justify a programmatic waiver to extend each Eligible Entity’s Final Proposal deadline, an action that is also in the best interest of the Federal Government.”
The extension is in line with the rethinking of the $42.45 billion program by the new administration in general and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in particular.
New Street Research policy advisor Blair Levin says that the FCC may be looking at reorienting BEAD later this month.
Levin, who headed up the FCC team that created the National Broadband Plan more than a decade ago, sees four possible shifts:
- Requiring states to rebid and imposing a federal high-cost threshold that would shift funds from fiber to satellite
- Requiring states to eliminate certain requirements but allowing the results of the application process to stand with only marginal adjustments
- Setting some general rules but having the Commerce Department review each state’s awardee lists before approving the release of funds (the NTIA, which administers the BEAD Program, is part of the Commerce Department)
- Rewriting the BEAD Program rules to award all funding to satellite providers, rerunning the application process and returning money to the Treasury
A great deal of work has already been done on the NTIA BEAD program. For instance, here is a list of states that have made public a list of prequalified providers as of last week. It should be noted that some states are not prequalifying and others may have created a list but not released it and opted to not create a list at all:
- Arizona
- Arkansas
- Connecticut
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Kentucky
- Louisiana
- Maine
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Mississippi
- Nebraska
- New Mexico
- Oregon
- South Carolina
- Tennessee
- Utah
- Virginia
- Wisconsin
It will be interesting to see if efforts by these states would have been unnecessary under BEAD rules that eventually will be adopted by the NTIA.
Stakeholders want clarity — and they also want the program to move on. Early this month, state legislators from 28 states sent a letter requesting U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick permit the NTIA to allow state BEAD plans and digital equity (DE) programs to proceed without delay. That request has not been granted.
The bipartisan group also asked that any program changes be optional. Mandatory changes could undo the signees’ BEAD and digital equity plans and delay broadband deployment by more than a year, the letter said.
