The distribution of potentially funded locations changed “substantially”...

The distribution of potentially funded locations changed “substantially” between Connect America Model 3.2 and 4.0, CenturyLink told FCC officials Tuesday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1pk4Bc0). “More sparsely populated locations that had been reserved for the Remote Areas Fund have replaced somewhat more populated high-cost areas in the universe of potentially-eligible CAF II locations,” the ILEC said. Its analysis “raises several questions” for agency staff to consider, it said, citing the “higher-than-expected number” of sites that cover “just a few locations,” and “more instances than expected where normal assumptions regarding the economics of sharing feeder facilities may not apply in practice because of the uneconomic nature of the areas served.” However, “it does not appear at this time that changes to the model itself are called for,” CenturyLink said.