Grace Tepper

Nearly all 56 states and territories have submitted their Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program final proposals to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). For the few remaining states that received extensions on the deadline to submit final plans—California, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands—this process is still underway. This week, Guam, Texas, and Washington (DC)are on deck for a breakdown of their BEAD final proposals.

The Federal Communications Commission's October 28 Open Meeting was…productive. The FCC ushered in changes to space licensing and satellite infrastructure procedures, removed a swath of wireless rules, and launched a proceeding to overhaul current broadband label requirements, which may significantly impact the information consumers have available to them when subscribing to broadband plans.

The North Carolina Department of Information Technology’s (NCDIT) Office of Digital Opportunity is defining what it means to be digitally prepared. Recognizing that digital access alone is not enough, NCDIT released its North Carolina Digital Skills Standards, a statewide framework that identifies the essential knowledge and abilities residents need to engage in civic, economic, and social life.

Despite the federal government shutdown, states across the country are making strides on their own broadband and digital equity initiatives. Four states in particular caught our eye this week. Many of these initiatives were designed to work in tandem with federal investments, especially those created by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, or to fill gaps created by the sunsetting of crucial programs, like the ACP.

The vast majority of states and territories have released their Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program final proposals for public comment. Many have closed their feedback periods, wrapped up their plans, and submitted those plans to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) for approval. For the few remaining states that received extensions on the deadline to submit final plans, this process is still underway. Here are a few of the states that are in the process of completing their plans.

A constellation of socioeconomic factors influences a household's ability to pay for broadband service. Often, broadband affordability is the final barrier to adoption, and the amount of affordable broadband options can vary greatly from community to community. New research by Ambika Nair, Community Development Analyst at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, introduces a novel measure—Relative Broadband Affordability—that can be used to compare a community’s broadband affordability relative to other communities in the same city.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said, "Today’s decision corrects course. It restores the FCC’s commitment to following the law as written and respecting the intent of Congress. Section 254 of the Communications Act is clear: E-Rate funding is meant to enhance access to telecommunications services in classrooms and libraries. A school bus is neither. We cannot simply reinterpret “classrooms” to mean any place where learning might occur. That’s not how statutory interpretation works, and it’s not how responsible policymaking should work either."

Tech companies are also planning to use new broadband infrastructure to power data centers with enormous processing capabilities for a variety of applications, including artificial intelligence. However, the data center buildout comes with economic and environmental risks for many communities, especially those in the southern parts of the U.S.

More states and territories are releasing their final Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment Program final proposals for public comment before seeking  National Telecommunications and Information Administration approval. These states received extensions past the NTIA’s early September deadline to submit final plans. 

• The Idaho Office of Broadband released its Draft Final Proposal for public comment on September 16. In its proposal, Idaho plans to spend almost $136 million of its $583 million in BEAD funding towards broadband deployment.

Much has been said about the national broadband deployment process being undertaken with the support of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment Program. On September 18, the House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology held a hearing to discuss 29 (yes, 29!) bills aimed at streamlining the broadband permitting process to expedite deployment. At the hearing, the subcommittee sought to understand how permitting processes create deployment challenges for internet service providers.