Letter

Since Phase I of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) concluded, it has become more expensive to deploy broadband due to rampant increases in construction materials, equipment, and labor costs. Given the challenges, RDOF winners—especially smaller providers—are facing, we appreciate your review of the following options:

We write regarding the Affordable Connectivity Program, an important tool in our efforts to close the digital divide. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act provided significant funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program, which has already enabled 18 million Americans to access the high-speed broadband services they need. However, given the current rate of enrollment, projections indicate that the funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program could be exhausted as early as the first quarter of 2024.

Thank you for your letter sent on March 16, 2023, asking for specific information regarding the Federal Communications Commission’s distribution of funds in the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program (EBB), Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), COVID-19 Telehealth program and the Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF).

Are Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) subsidies being targeted to households currently without broadband?

Since the passage of the Broadband DATA Act, the Federal Communications Commission has worked carefully to implement the requirements of the law and to begin the iterative data collection and challenge processes envisioned by the Act through the creation of its Broadband Data Collection program. As required by the Broadband DATA Act, the FCC has built an entirely new data-collection system for ingesting, validating, and aggregating both provider data for download and publication on the National Broadband Map. To do so, the Broadband DATA Act required the Commission to develop the Broadband

On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than 230 national organizations to promote and protect the rights of all persons in the US, and the 165 undersigned civil society organizations, municipal governments, and other interested groups, we write to request robust additional funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). The ACP’s current rate of expenditure is roughly $500 million per month.

In the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act (the Act), Congress directed the Federal Communications Commission to establish the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program to advance our national security by supporting the removal, replacement, and disposal of communications equipment and services produced or provided by Huawei Technologies Company or ZTE Corporation from our nation’s communications networks.

A recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report uncovered that “federal broadband efforts are fragmented and overlapping, with more than 100 programs administered by 15 agencies.” We request that GAO build upon this work and conduct an additional review of federal, state, and local broadband efforts to determine the effectiveness of each program.

The Federal Communications Commission is working to ensure that all areas of the United States can access high-speed, high-quality broadband, through a revision of the Alternative Connect America Model (A-CAM) program. The program is meant to provide additional universal service support to certain rural carriers in exchange for increasing deployment to more locations at higher speeds.

Sen. John Thune (R-SD) led 10 colleagues in a letter to National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) Assistant Secretary Alan Davidson expressing concerns with the $42.45 billion Broadband, Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program’s Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO).