Broadband mapping provision of House-passed infrastructure measure poses risk to timely disbursement of state funding

The Largest U.S. Investment in Broadband Deployment Ever | Benton Institute for Broadband & Society: Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program (And the Need for Better Broadband Maps) The U.S. Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has six months to create the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program to support projects to construct and deploy broadband networks. Congress has allocated $42.45 billion for the program which will prioritize expansion of broadband in rural areas and states that rank below other states on broadband access and deployment. A key element in the implementation of the program is broadband mapping taking place at the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC is in the process of updating its current broadband maps with more detailed and precise information on the availability of fixed and mobile broadband services.

The Broadband Deployment Accuracy and Technological Availability (DATA) Act, signed into law in March 2020, requires the FCC to change the way broadband data is collected, verified, and reported. Specifically, the FCC must collect and disseminate granular broadband service availability data (broadband maps) from wired, fixed-wireless, satellite, and mobile broadband providers. To do this, the FCC is required to establish the Broadband Serviceable Location Fabric (a dataset of geocoded information for all broadband service locations, atop which broadband maps are overlaid) as the vehicle for reporting broadband service availability data. Additionally, the FCC must put forth specified requirements for service availability data collected from broadband providers, and it must create a challenge process to enable the submission of independent data challenging the accuracy of FCC broadband maps.

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This provision of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that passed the U.S. House of Representatives late this week and expected to be quickly signed into law is the largest risk factor to the measure's timely implementation. 

Given the nation's fraught history of broadband mapping, that key provision of the funding eligibility formula and the development of procedures to challenge their accuracy is likely to set off time consuming controversy between investor owned providers, consumer interest and state and federal regulators, bogging down federal disbursements for months and possibly years. The billions of dollars at stake provide impetus for these groups to file challenges and raise questions over the accuracy of the maps, neighborhood by neighborhood.

Eligibility for up to 75 percent grant funding for advanced telecom infrastructure builds is prioritized to “unserved areas,” defined as those where at least 80 percent of premises are unserved – those not having any providers offering service with throughput of at least 25 Mbps down and 3 Mbps up. That's open to gaming by fixed wireless providers who could conceivably claim offers of service meeting or exceeding the throughput minimum but at exorbitant rates.

“Underserved” areas – defined those lacking access to “reliable broadband service” with no providers offering service with throughput of at least 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up are secondarily eligible. For both categories, funding eligibility is limited to areas where least 80 percent of premises are unserved or underserved. Neighborhoods failing to meet the 80 percent threshold would be out of luck and continue to potentially suffer redlining by incumbent providers serving only select parts of them.