Raimondo Denies GOP Claims of Rate Regulation, Other Non-IIJA Mandates in BEAD NOFO

Senate Commerce Republicans “will pursue all avenues to try and get some of those changes made … one way or the other,” Thune told us. NTIA has made BEAD “so unwieldy and so hard to use with all of these stipulations and conditions they’re attaching to qualifying for the money in the pipeline,” including some involving Democrats’ “green agenda” on climate change that the GOP doesn’t believe is germane to improving connectivity, he said.

House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Bob Latta, R-Ohio, and ranking member Doris Matsui, D-Calif., downplayed Senate Commerce Republicans’ push for BEAD NOFO revisions, with Latta telling us he hasn’t “seen the letter” they sent to NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson. Matsui emphasized changes to the NOFO now would be problematic due to how close NTIA is to issuing final funding allocations to the states. The notice language has “been out there for nearly a year,” so “I don’t think we should touch it at all,” she told us.

House Communications plans to bring in Davidson for a May NTIA oversight hearing “and one of the things that we all want to talk about” is BEAD, Latta said. “We’re obviously concerned about how that money is going to be distributed.” Negotiations on the hearing date were ongoing Wednesday, but aides anticipate it will happen in late May, said a lobbyist who follows House Commerce Committee talks.

Lawmakers “need to know how the dollars are being distributed, who’s going to get it,” Latta said. “We always want this money to get going to the truly unserved areas” first. House Communications is emphasizing it doesn’t want NTIA “picking winners and losers” by preferencing any specific broadband technology in contravention to IIJA’s intent, he said: “We want to make sure whatever is the best way to get the broadband out” in “the most economical way” is the technology that NTIA funds in any given area.

“I can assure you that there are no requirements” in the NOFO that are “at odds with statutory intent,” Raimondo said in response to a question from Senate Appropriations CJS ranking member Susan Collins, R-Maine. “There are some aspects of the notice that track” with IIJA’s mandate, but others “deviate from congressional intent,” including rules that appear to favor fiber over other broadband forms even though the statute required a tech-neutral approach to allocating BEAD funding, Collins said: “It’s not as if we didn’t have discussions” within the bipartisan group that crafted IIJA “about those issues.”

Fiber is “the most reliable” broadband form and would be “future-proof,” but NTIA is “open to all technologies” in considering how to distribute the BEAD money, Raimondo said. Funding decisions will be based on what technology will give people “the best service they can that’s appropriate for that area.” That may mean fiber in some places and “fixed wireless” in others, she said. “There are no other mandates” despite critics’ claims that some language would require rate regulation or preference government-owned networks.

“We’re asking for transparency in the vendor process,” Raimondo said. “We are not preferencing government-owned networks. What we are saying is show us transparency in the procurement process, because if you pick a large ISP over something else, we just want to know why.” She wants “to hold everyone accountable. Big ISPs shouldn’t get a leg up; government-owned shouldn’t get a leg up. We’re in this for the consumer.”

Appropriations Questions

Senate Indian Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, and CJS Chairwoman Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., were among others who referenced broadband issues during the hearing. NTIA believes “we have enough funding” to cover the estimated $4 billion needed to address all tribal connectivity concerns between money for the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program and specific amounts tribes are eligible to receive from BEAD, Raimondo told Schatz. Shaheen probed why NTIA believes it can move forward with finalizing BEAD funding by June 30 given ongoing questions about the accuracy of FCC broadband coverage maps that the agency is using to determine project eligibility.

“We feel a sense of urgency” since “every day that we don’t put the money out the door is a day that people don’t have access to the internet,” Raimondo said. "We've all visited people in rural areas who are suffering every day because they don't have" connectivity. NTIA is working “very closely” with the FCC on the accuracy of broadband coverage data and the existing information is the “most granular” the commission has ever had, she said: "I don't think we can delay" the BEAD rollout, but the ongoing map challenge process is an effective mechanism for continuing to improve the data.

Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, raised concerns about how NTIA plans to calculate its allocation of IIJA’s middle-mile funding for rural and mountainous areas like their states. West Virginia’s deployment “cost is much higher … than it is in flatter terrain,” Manchin said. Raimondo emphasized IIJA’s carveout for middle-mile funding in high-cost areas. “We’re working with the FCC to define” exactly what qualifies for that specific money “and how much a state might get due to that," she said.

Raimondo told Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., she believes fully funding the FCC’s Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Reimbursement Program “is essential for security.” Fischer said she remains “very concerned about the immediate national security risk” that the program’s current $3.08 billion funding shortfall “presents for our communications infrastructure.” She and Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., filed the Defend Our Networks Act last week to reallocate 3% of unspent and unobligated funding from the FY 2021 appropriations omnibus, the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act and other COVID-19 aid packages to make up the rip and replace program’s deficit (see 2304210069).