U.S. cities and townships are concerned that a recent rule by President Joe Biden’s administration could prevent them from taking advantage of $ 350 billion in aid to relieve coronavirus to expand high-speed Internet connections.
Biden has set itself the goal of providing fast and affordable internet to all American households. The massive American rescue plan took a step toward that by including broadband infrastructure among the main uses for pandemic aid flowing in each city, county, and state.
But an interim rule issued by the U.S. Treasury Department has reduced broadband eligibility. It focuses on areas that do not have reliable broadband, which connects devices to the Internet via a cable or data line, at download speeds of at least 25 megabits per second and upload speeds of at least 3 Mbps.
This threshold guarantees funding for remote rural areas that have slow or no internet service, and coincides with the broadband definition established by the Federal Communications Commission in 2015. But cities argue that the eligibility mark passes overlook the realities of the current needs of the Internet.
While most cities already have broadband available, the speed may not be fast enough to drive multiple people in a home trying to work, study, and stream entertainment simultaneously, a common scenario during the coronavirus pandemic. The price may also be higher than what lower-income residents can afford.
“They basically prioritize these rural areas over underserved urban areas where there is more population,” said Detta Kissel, a retired Treasury lawyer who helped draft the agency’s rules and now advocates a Best Internet Service in the Washington, DC Suburbs Arlington, Virginia.
Several cities, including Washington, Los Angeles, Milwaukee and San Antonio, have filed public comments with the Treasury Department urging it to loosen the eligibility rule to spend money to alleviate the broadband pandemic. Some want the Treasury to define poorly served areas as 100 Mbps download and upload speeds.
This would increase the number of locations eligible for funding from about 11 million to 82 million households and businesses across the country, according to a study conducted for the American’s Communications Association, which represents small and medium-sized internet providers. means.
Cities argue that the Treasury should use an 100/100 Mbps eligibility threshold because the same speed projects are supposed to be achieved if they receive funding. An independent infrastructure bill that opens in Congress it’s more flexible, allowing some of its $ 65 billion in broadband funding to go to “underserved” areas that don’t have 100 Mbps download speeds and 20 Mbps upload speeds.
If the Treasury goes ahead with its originally written rule, sparsely populated areas that currently lack broadband could skip certain urban areas in their Internet speed. This does not look good on some mayors.
“Downtown Memphis has an absolute need for broadband connectivity like rural Tennessee,” said Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland, who wants to secure the Treasury Department before spending $ 20 million. American Rescue Plan on a Broadband Project.
Residents almost anywhere in Milwaukee already have access to at least one ISP that offers 25 Mbps download speeds and 3 Mbps upload speeds. But in some parts of the city, less than half of households are subscribed to Internet service because of its cost, said David Henke, the city’s chief information officer.
“If you don’t have a job and you can’t afford broadband, it’s kind of a cycle,” Henke said. “You don’t have remote learning, remote work, telemedicine and you basically participate in a modern society.”
Milwaukee has applied for a $ 12.5 million grant from Wisconsin’s participation in the American Rescue Plan and would provide $ 2.5 million of its own money to alleviate the pandemic by expanding affordable broadband to more parts of the city, Henke said. But the city wants the Treasury Department to extend the “reduced wording” of its rule.
Although the public comment period ended in July, the Treasury has not set a date for which it will publish the final version of the rule. A Treasury official said the department is conducting a thorough review of comments that are likely to “continue into the fall.”
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, is among those urging the Treasury Department to adopt a broader eligibility threshold. He wrote that it would be “severely misguided” to assume that communities are adequately catered for by the “unfortunately obsolete” broadband benchmark the department has established.
Broadband industry groups have generally urged the Treasury to follow its original plan to target money to areas with lower Internet speeds.
“Instead of reinvesting in locations that already have broadband to improve it, the pandemic relief money should go to” sites that have no broadband, “said Patrick Halley, general counsel for USTelecom, which includes AT&T, Verizon and others.
The NCTA cable industry group urged treasury officials to further tighten eligibility. You want to limit the number of homes that already have a faster service that can be included in target improvement areas. It also wants to eliminate the potential for subjective local decisions about areas that do not have reliable service.
Allowing improvements to areas that already meet the minimum speed limits could divert money from the most needy and hard-to-reach areas, leaving them out of service once federal money is spent, industry groups said.
According to the study by the American’s Communications Association, bringing a super-fast Internet service to all sites that currently do not have speeds of 25/3 Mbps could cost between $ 20 billion and $ 37 billion. This cost rises to between $ 106 billion and $ 179 billion by covering all areas that currently do not have speeds of 100/100 Mbps.
“As a matter of prioritization, we think it’s best to start with the areas that have the least,” said Ross Lieberman, the association’s senior vice president of government affairs.
While most complaints about the Treasury Department rule come from larger cities, some rural residents have also raised concerns.
Charlie Hopkins, a retired computer hardware and software designer, owns a home on an island in Maine that can only be reached by boat. Internet speeds at home recorded just 5 Mbps to download and only 0.4 Mbps to upload when recently tested on The Associated Press.
Because some homes have faster speeds, Hopkins worries that the Treasury Department rule could make it difficult to get funding for the island to improve its internet. He said broadband is essential to attract and retain residents.
“Other cities and towns in Maine, especially cities, are getting faster fiber-based internet,” Hopkins said. “I don’t like being in a position where we’re essentially being told, ‘Well, you’re at the end of the Earth, so don’t classify yourself.'”