rdof

The Federal Communications Commission approved a small do-over to the rules for its new broadband subsidy program, the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF). Instead of blocking subsidies to any area where state broadband dollars are being spent, it will only do so where the money is paying for service at a minimum of 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload speeds.

That’s good new for California. Our primary broadband subsidy program – the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) – deems communities with broadband at the achingly slow rate of 6 Mbps down/1 Mbps up as adequately served, and only requires grant recipients who build infrastructure with state money to hit the barely better speed of 10 Mbps down/1 Mbps up.… More

The final language of the Federal Communications Commission’s decision to launch a new broadband subsidy program could cause headaches in California. The FCC approved the new $20 billion Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) program last week, apparently with eligibility rule changes to the draft version published earlier in January.

In remarks prepared for the meeting, commission Geoffrey Starks flagged new language that would exclude places that are getting broadband subsidies from other sources…

I cannot support provisions of the Order that penalize the many states that have made their own investments in rural broadband deployment.

The Federal Communications Commission will begin the process of handing out $16 billion in broadband service subsidies in November, with another $4.4 billion coming sometime later. Commissioners approved the new Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) program at their meeting in Washington, D.C. yesterday. They set the minimum standard for acceptable broadband service at 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload speeds: any census block that completely lacks access to service at that speed level will eligible for subsidies in November.… More

The FCC is heading toward a vote on Thursday that would raise its eligibility and minimum service standards for broadband subsidies to 25 down/3 Mbps up and award $20 billion in broadband subsidies as quickly as possible, perhaps in a single reverse auction in November. That’s welcome progress and a great thing for states that either have rational broadband policies or have no interest in broadband policy at all.

But not so great for California, which has irrational broadband subsidy policies.… More