A bicameral, bipartisan agriculture bill would create a...

A bicameral, bipartisan agriculture bill would create a pilot for gigabit networks. Lawmakers in the House and Senate unveiled several hundreds of pages worth of a conference report on what’s known as the “Farm Bill” Monday night (http://1.usa.gov/M9TrYK). The Agriculture Act includes a section on access to broadband telecom in rural areas, specifying how loans will be distributed and that the government is “to prioritize loans and loan guarantees to all or part of rural communities that do not have residential broadband service that meets the minimum acceptable level of broadband service,” said the conference report starting at Section 6104 on page 533. It specifies that the minimum acceptable broadband speeds for rural areas are 4 Mbps downstream and 1 Mbps upstream. The Farm Bill also mentions that the Department of Agriculture would create what’s known as the Rural Gigabit Network Pilot Program, with its own loan allowances. Any entities interested in gigabit network loans must show the government they have the ability to provide such fast broadband service, apply and then build out the fast network within three years, with $10 million authorized for each of the fiscal years 2014 through 2018, according to the bill conference report. When describing broadband loans more generally, it includes a notice requirement that the secretary of agriculture must “promptly provide a fully searchable database on the website of the Rural Utilities Service” that contains information on loan applicants and the regions they propose to serve. Anyone receiving assistance would have to “submit a semiannual report for 3 years after the completion of the project,” it added. The bill proposes specific unserved levels that the government should be focusing on. The measure would also compel the secretary of agriculture to do a study within 180 days of the bill’s enactment in conjunction with the secretary of commerce and the chairman of the FCC of how data collected through the Agriculture broadband programs, specifically looking at “address-level data,” could be shared to help support the National Broadband Plan. Within 60 days of completing the report, the Agriculture Department would have to report these findings to congressional committees. The House may consider the bill as early as Wednesday.