Comments to the NTIA on the Use of BEAD Funds Leftover after Broadband Deployment

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration asks what to do with the $21 billion it has yet to commit, but the question it should first ask is how to ensure the $21 billion that NTIA has already committed to broadband deployment accrues benefits to the American people rather than going to unused networks that sit gathering dust. It is important to consider that the “non-deployment” funds were intended to solve a particular problem—the persistent broadband adoption gap—that simply building more networks without addressing demand will do nothing to address. States know where these adoption gaps are and what mechanisms need to be funded to solve them, and NTIA must permit them to spend the funding as they see fit, consistent with Congressional intent. For an administration opposed to wasteful spending, there should be no greater fear than building $20 billion networks that connect nothing and nobody. And yet those are exactly what the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program threatens to buy if NTIA chooses to ignore the adoption side of the program altogether. There is still time to turn the ship around and set BEAD back on course. NTIA now faces a choice. Waste tens of billions of dollars constructing expensive networks that ultimately fail to address the barriers that keep millions of Americans offline, and steward a program that falls short of its goals—or follow the law.