BTOP might have $442 million in the kitty, although almost certainly not. Or $257 million or $15 million or zilch. For BIP, I can’t even estimate what’s left, but my best guess is that money is already gone.
First, I want to give credit where credit is due. Fred Dyste, via his Digital West blog, has been the gold standard for tracking BTOP (Broadband Technology Opportunities Program) and BIP (Broadband Initiatives Program) stimulus grant applications and awards. He’s been delivering invaluable tracking and analysis of who’s asking for money and who’s getting it. Most of the numbers I’m using were provided by Fred.
Yesterday, about $482 million in BTOP grants were announced for several states, along with about $518 million in BIP grants and loans. On Friday, Hawaii received $35.9 million in BTOP grants. Adding those numbers to Fred’s tabulations for the first round of BTOP/BIP grants and his running total to 28 August 2010, the total for infrastructure, public computer center (PCC) and sustainable broadband adoption (SBA) BTOP awards is $3,791 million and $3,516 million for BIP awards (allowing for the cancellation of a $19 million BIP award).
The stimulus program originally gave $4,700 million to BTOP and $2,500 million to BIP. On that measure, the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) has given out an extra $1 billion. They can do that because they are giving out grants and loans, which are accounted for differently, and they have some separate funding for the loan program. Do they have any more money to give out? Maybe.
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is only making grants and they don’t have deep pockets of their own to dip into. In fact, Congress has already pulled back $302 million from the program to spend on other things, leaving only $4,398 million. The math looks like this:
| Category | Grants Made |
| Infrastructure | $3,506 million |
| Public computer center | $127 million |
| Sustainable broadband adoption | $159 million |
| Mapping allocation | $350 million |
| Total | $4,141 millon |
So in theory, that leaves $271 million to spend on non-mapping BTOP projects. Fred has tracked $179 million in mapping grants, so maybe there’s another $171 million available, bringing the total to $442 million. But I doubt it. NTIA is saving a big chunk of the mapping work for itself, and there’s no reason to think they’ll let go of that money.
In fact, NTIA might be keeping a bit more for itself. Originally, NTIA said that only $2,600 million was available for infrastructure, PCC and SBA grants in the second round, and they’ve given out $2,585 million. On that basis, there’s only $15 million left, without even counting the $302 million Congress clawed back.
The original stimulus bill set aside $200 million for PCC grants and $250 million for SBA grants. However, in cutting money, Congress didn’t specify how to spread the cuts around. If you figure things, like Fred does, on a pro rata basis, that means subtracting $47 and $29 million from the PCC and SBA categories respectively, so those programs are tapped out. But NTIA has considerable discretion when it comes to running BTOP, so maybe not. If there is any remaining money, it could go anywhere.