Lawmakers Eye FCC Broadband Mapping Order

Lawmaker interest in the draft order on improving its broadband coverage data collection practices continued Wednesday and Thursday before its afternoon release (see 1907110071). The order and broadband mapping legislation came up repeatedly during a House Agriculture Commodity Exchanges Subcommittee hearing. A day earlier, the Senate Commerce Committee scuttled a planned markup of the Broadband Deployment Accuracy and Technological Availability (Data) Act (S-1822), one of several measures seen as potentially influencing the proposal's direction (see 1907100061).

“It is very important that rural America weigh in” on the mapping order and with “Congress as we continue to talk about proposals to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure,” House Agriculture Commodity Exchanges Chairman David Scott, D-Ga., said during the subcommittee's rural broadband hearing. “House Agriculture is “committed to making sure that we expand” Capitol Hill's investment in rural broadband. The “key” to “open the door” on rural broadband will be “when Congress moves and puts forward the rebuilding of our crumbling infrastructure program,” he said. “And we can't wait for that to start.” Scott isn't on the House all-Democratic House Task Force on Rural Broadband that Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., formed in May (see 1905130053).

“All options are on the table” for improving broadband availability, said House Agriculture Commodity Exchanges ranking member Austin Scott, R-Ga. “This includes strengthening effective programs already in place” at the FCC and Agriculture Department, “advocating for robust broadband support in an infrastructure package and even encouraging innovative technologies like TV white spaces” to bridge the digital divide. He also cited rural broadband funding included in the 2018 Agriculture Improvement Act farm bill (see 1812200067). Scott empathizes with rural citizens who don't have access to broadband, saying “sometimes the fastest connection I have at my rural home” in Tifton, Georgia, is his cellphone.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., led a letter with Senate Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, and two other Commerce Committee members before the draft's afternoon release urging the FCC to take concrete steps to improve its maps. “Precise, granular, and accurate data is essential to determining which parts of the country remain unserved and where to more efficiently target broadband deployment funding,” the senators wrote FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. “Improved data is essential for Congress and the Commission to identify where adequate broadband service is and is not, and how to avoid subsidizing overbuilding of existing networks.” The other signers were Sens. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., and Jon Tester, D-Mont.

The senators said their Broadband Data Improvement Act (HR-3162/S-1522) and other legislation “would provide the FCC with an effective framework to replace its flawed census block-based system.” HR-3162/S-1522 would direct federal funds to build out broadband infrastructure and require broadband providers to report more accurate data on the locations they serve to help improve the national broadband map (see 1905160087). Proposed legislative solutions “include reforms that would require wired, fixed wireless and satellite broadband providers to submit data that is more granular and precise to the” FCC, they said. “Allowing fixed broadband providers to submit 'shapefiles' would provide more detailed information about the areas they actually serve than the current census block approach.” They also urged the FCC to ensure its order provides “consumers, state, local and tribal government entities the opportunity to challenge erroneous coverage data. Such a process will help the Commission improve the accuracy of the data.”

Missouri Farm Bureau President David Hurst was the only witness who backed specific legislation, endorsing HR-3162. Hurst said the group particularly supports the bill's aim of creating more accurate and granular FCC maps. Current broadband maps “fail to accurately determine broadband access,” he said. Farmers and ranchers “must have access to fixed and mobile broadband to be more efficient, economical and responsive to environmental needs.”

Dave Hengel, executive director of Greater Bemidji in Bemidji, Minnesota, said Congress should “do all it can to help other parts of rural America reap the benefits” that his region has enjoyed because its rural telecom cooperative, Paul Bunyan Communications, “took the bold and visionary approach of laying one of the largest all-fiber broadband networks in the nation.” Rural “America needs broadband not only to help farmers efficiently produce the crops that are sold around the world but to help rural small businesses participate in the global economy and help all rural citizens experience the potentially life-changing health care, educational and employment benefits of broadband,” he said.