Reducing the broadband affordability gap is an important and noble goal. Unfortunately, it is far from clear whether Lifeline, the federal program tasked with getting low-income households online, actually addresses this problem. For over a decade, academics, government watchdogs, and independent auditors have criticized the Federal Communications Commission’s inability or unwillingness to measure the program’s effectiveness—while private studies suggest much of this spending may be misdirected toward families at no risk of losing internet access. The Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) represents a significant expansion of the benefits available under Lifeline. But at the ACP’s core, one finds the same fundamental flaw that fatally infects Lifeline: It gives a monthly subsidy to a wide range of recipients based on income or participation in other federal programs, on the unproven assumption that these payments will improve broadband adoption rates among low-income families. Like Lifeline, ACP’s proponents have not studied the relevant population to determine the drivers of low-income non-adoption. Given that well over 70 percent of ACP-eligible households already subscribe to broadband service, giving $30 per month to such a wide swath of recipients makes it likely that significant sums of money will be wasted on households that are not at risk of canceling their broadband service. With careful study and some minor legislative tweaks to the existing statute, ACP could avoid duplicating the efficiency and effectiveness problems that have long plagued the Lifeline program.

• First, policymakers should adopt a data-driven approach to subsidy distribution. Rather than simply offering an arbitrary amount in assistance to anyone who qualifies for other forms of government assistance, the FCC should identify and survey low-income households that currently lack broadband, to identify these families’ characteristics and ascertain the barriers to adoption.
• With the results of this study, the agency then could design eligibility criteria that target low-income non-adopters in particular, rather than continuing Lifeline’s scattershot program of aiding all low-income households broadly.
• Finally, with a better-tailored ACP program to help close the low-income broadband gap, Congress should shutter the Lifeline program.

Whether or not the US closes its digital divide may come down to the fate of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP): the $14.25 billion program currently subsidizing broadband by $30/month for over 15.7 million households (up to $75 on tribal lands). That's the view of the National Urban League (NUL). The NUL zeroed in on uncertainty about the future of the ACP as the "greatest challenge before us." At present, the ACP – which was passed and funded in a package of $65 billion for broadband through the 2021 Infrastructure Investments and Jobs Act – is projected by some estimates to run out of money as soon as 2024. "Failure to extend ACP will devastate the 15 million households and counting that already benefit from or are seeking to enroll in this program and will threaten their ability to thrive in the digital age," said the National Urban League in a letter responding to Senator John Thune's (R-SD) inquiry about the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program and other federal broadband matters. "That, in and of itself, is a disaster for our country economically and socially, but the potential discontinuation of ACP will also cause a great inefficiency in the BEAD program." If the ACP isn't reauthorized, there is also a risk of the federal government "overpaying for broadband deployments," resulting in federal dollars "funding deployments to significantly fewer unserved and underserved homes and businesses." "That reduction in the states' ability to meet the Congressional goal of closing the digital divide will not be due to the misconduct of any grantee or state but because Congress had not made its intention clear about a critical financial input to the models that the private sector uses to apply for BEAD funding."

Broadband operators, including those represented by ACA Connects and NCTA–The Internet & Television Association, have asked the Federal Communications Commission to either clarify or reconsider two requirements in rules implementing consumer broadband labels that they say may not pass legal muster otherwise. Congress mandated the labels so consumers can better gauge just what kind of broadband service they are getting, including price, speed, and quality. In a joint petition for clarification or reconsideration filed with the FCC, the associations said they generally support the adoption of the regulator’s label rules, which are based on the FCC’s 2016 voluntary labels. They do, however, have a bone to pick with the following two regulations they say “depart“ from that 2016 regime:

• The first is the requirement that operators itemize state and local government fees;
• The second is the mandate that broadband providers “create and retain documentation” regarding “each instance when [a provider] directs a consumer to the label at an alternative sales channel,” i.e. in retail stores or phone interactions.

The associations said the first requirement could cause “significant” confusion for consumers and create unnecessary complexity for providers. Without both clarifications, they warned, the FCC may be violating various laws including the Administrative Procedure Act, the Paperwork Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which created the labeling mandate.

The Utah Broadband Center (UBC), powered by the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity, announces two new broadband planning grants are available to help local governments, municipalities, nonprofits, and government agencies develop plans to expand high-speed internet access and adoption in Utah communities. These grants—funded by the federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program and the Digital Equity Act—empower local stakeholders to identify areas of the state that need increased investment in infrastructure, skills training, or access to devices to facilitate Utahns’ access to critical digital resources such as telemedicine, remote work, or educational opportunities. The first grant is the Local Broadband Planning Grant, which helps local communities identify gaps in broadband infrastructure and develop a plan to connect unserved households. The second grant is the Local Digital Access Planning Grant, which helps recipients develop a five-year plan to address affordability, digital skills, and access to the necessary equipment to utilize online resources. Both grants are accepting applications through Feb. 2, 2023. Recipients are expected to complete their five-year plans by June 1, 2023, for those plans to be included in the statewide digital connectivity action plan. 

Big kudos to the Federal Communications Commission for the release of its Communications Marketplace Report at the end of 2022. This is the first Communications Marketplace Report released under FCC Chairwoman Rosenworcel’s leadership, so none of us should be surprised that there are vast improvements in the information covered. For example, the FCC is reporting prices from the top 11 home broadband providers, showing that the range of prices collected from each provider’s website was consistent with a recent Consumer Reports study. That study finds that the median cost of high-speed internet service was $74.99 per month, and approximately half of the households are paying between $60 and $90 per month. For the first time, the Report also offers a snapshot of providers that are using data caps for home internet service — three of the top providers do so, as well as 130 additional providers across the US, including smaller companies. The Report also includes detail about the technologies offered by the 11 largest home providers. The FCC finds that there is insufficient choice for home (fixed) broadband by stating: “[c]urrently available data demonstrates that millions of Americans lack access to high-speed broadband or can only access high-speed broadband through a single provider.”

The Federal Communications Commission establishes a comprehensive and coordinated nationwide approach to managing the 4.9 GHz (4940-4990 MHz) band while retaining its locally controlled, public safety nature. In doing so, the FCC solidifies the band’s status as public safety spectrum, while also allowing secondary, non-public safety use as agreed to by public safety licensees through a new leasing model. Critical to this vision for the 4.9 GHz band is the addition of a nationwide Band Manager, which will be selected based on its expertise and connections to the public safety community and will coordinate all operations in the band to ensure that any non-public safety use remains fully secondary to, and preemptible by, public safety operations. This nationwide framework will optimize public safety use and enable the integration of the latest commercially available technologies, such as 5G. The FCC also modifies its rules to allow for the collection of granular data on public safety operations in the 4.9 GHz band. These data combined with a formal coordination structure performed by the Band Manager will improve interference mitigation efforts, bolster public safety confidence in the band, and will play a crucial role in the Band Manager’s ability to find opportunities for secondary, non-public safety access. The FCC also makes several changes to the technical rules for the band to promote more robust public safety operations. Finally, the FCC seeks comment on the details of implementing the new leasing model to achieve its goals of allowing robust locally controlled public safety operations while ensuring consistent, nationwide rules that promote overall spectral efficiency, foster innovation, and drive down equipment costs