BEAD and State Broadband Offices

I’ve been saying for the last few years that the hardest job in the industry has been the folks who head State Broadband Offices. A lot of the hard work these folks did over the last three years was erased when the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) first eliminated the Digital Equity grants and then recently eviscerated the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program grants. What is probably the most disturbing about the sudden change in the rules is that BEAD was finally working. A large majority of states have started the broadband award process and have been reviewing grant applications. States like Louisiana and Nevada made it through the award process and were ready to award a lot of money to build a lot of fiber while staying within the budget that BEAD gave them. Many states that are partway through the process report that they are getting grant requests to build fiber coming in lower than their expectations. The revised BEAD grants are nothing more than a one-round Rural Digital Opportunity Fund auction by State, where the internet service provider that asks for the least amount of funding wins.