Wyoming Subsidy Fight Shines Light on FCC Broadband Map

Problematic FCC maps and a rush to meet a federal deadline to use coronavirus relief money factor into a dispute over Wyoming broadband support, said the different sides in interviews. Tongue River Communications said it could go out of business due to Wyoming subsidizing overbuilding by Visionary Communications. The state said it relied on the commission’s Form 477 data to find the area unserved and lacked time for challenges, with the Dec. 30 deadline in March's Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (Cares) Act. “There’s blame all around, but it can be correctly done,” said former FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly.

O’Rielly condemned ConnectWyoming on Nov. 3 after Tongue River complained via the ACA Connects blog about the Wyoming Business Council’s (WBC) $1.1 million award to Visionary for fiber in Ranchester and Dayton. The family-owned cable company cited transparency concerns and sees conflict of interest in WBC funding companies with officials on the council's broadband subgroup. WBC said it trimmed an initially announced $86 million for 37 projects to $56.4 million for 33 projects by Visionary and six other ISPs. The issues show what impact FCC map accuracy can have on deployment nationally, officials said.

The FCC awarded Rural Digital Opportunity Fund support to the same company accused of overbuilding. Visionary got more than $4 million from RDOF for Wyoming areas including Ranchester and Dayton. The commission said it acted to improve broadband mapping data (see 2101190051).

Although aware of data inadequacies, WBC and Visionary leaders said there was no other map for evaluating applications. WBC decided if "we're using federal funds, we should use the federal source of truth,” said CEO Josh Dorrell. “Time was of the essence” and it's up to Tongue River to keep up with Form 477, he said. The FCC "needs to understand" the data "is being used ... and to make that as good as possible would be helpful and important to the future of broadband."

Visionary applied for money only in areas with poor service, said CEO Brian Worthen. “Everyone knows the FCC maps are a problem. The FCC has admitted the FCC maps are a problem.”

Tongue River General Manager Rob Hium disagrees. Worthen, on WBC’s Broadband Advisory Council, “knew how to manipulate this map and got grants for the areas he already provides service to,” Hium said: WBC wasn’t transparent and should have allowed challenges.

Wyoming bears responsibility for rushing, since time isn’t “more important than getting it right,” and using federal money “can’t be at the expense of existing providers,” said O’Rielly, now a visiting fellow at the Hudson Institute. “We have to have a very clear structure to prevent overbuilding,” he said. “The Cares Act was not tightened enough,” and if FCC data were “completely accurate, we’d be in a much better situation,” he said.

Mayor Peter Clark welcomed fiber to Ranchester. Previous options, including cable and fixed wireless, “barely” meet national standards and tend to slow down, he said. “If we are going to bridge the digital divide, we need a fiber optic network.”

Disputes

Wyoming "recommended applications that did not compete with existing providers who offer service speeds of at least” 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload, the governor’s office wrote Aug. 14. Also see here.

Tongue River and Visionary already provided speeds faster than 25/3 Mbps to the area, said Hium. He said Tongue River offered up to 100/5 Mbps over cable broadband throughout its footprint since 2018. Visionary had 50/5 Mbps fixed wireless, said Hium. Residents can also get CenturyLink, he said. That telco, now called Lumen, provides at least 25/3 Mbps in parts of Ranchester, said a spokesperson.

The FCC map didn’t show Tongue River when Wyoming reviewed applications. Tongue River filed Form 477 in the second half of 2019 after missing earlier deadlines, said Hium. The most recent map then was in the June 2019 dataset, released March 12. The FCC’s next update, based on a December 2019 dataset, arrived Nov. 12 and showed Tongue River coverage. The newer map also shows Visionary with 50/5 Mbps in more of Ranchester and Dayton.

ConnectWyoming was designed to quickly use Cares Act funds for rural broadband, emailed a spokesperson for Gov. Mark Gordon (R). “Given these time constraints, Wyoming Business Council staff relied on the most current information available from the FCC Form 477 database as its official/objective source of reliable service information to determine existing broadband capacity in the grant award areas. During the time the committee and WBC were considering these projects Tongue River Communication's facilities were not present on the FCC Form 477 database.”

Tongue River has itself to blame for not filing the form, Dorrell said.

Visionary applied for grants in “areas that had nothing," based on June 2019 data, said Worthen. The company called Tongue River to check service on addresses of for-sale houses and was told that 6 Mbps was the fastest, he said. Wyoming and other such rural, less populous states lack resources to make more accurate broadband maps, Worthen said: “It all comes down to the quality of the data that's submitted to the FCC,” and the agency isn’t “effectively policing that.”

“Some of it is being a small provider not understanding what the FCC does,” and more education by the agency and associations could help companies like Tongue River, O’Rielly said. Still, Wyoming had “plenty of time” for a challenge process, he said.

Tongue River filed all missed forms, but the December 2019 map still downplays the company's coverage because it shows none in some blocks it serves and slower speeds in census tracts that can get 100/5 Mbps, said Hium. The map shows a block as served only if the provider has a customer there, regardless of whether it can provide service, he said. The map likewise shows the highest speed chosen by customers there, he said.

Transparency

ConnectWyoming "was promoted publicly" and "available to all providers across the state,” said Dorrell.

ConnectWyoming “was really very rushed” and lacked transparency, disagreed Union Telephone Accounting Director Chris Reno. The ILEC and wireless company didn’t participate because it had fiber projects in progress and, in July, didn't think it could engineer a project, get permits and get facilities by Dec. 30, he said. Union might have participated if WBC had said earlier it would partly reimburse late projects, which it didn't do until Dec. 10, said Regulatory Affairs Analyst Virg Bodyfelt.

Tongue River didn’t learn of Visionary’s award until too late, protested Hium. Dorrell said WBC didn't email the cable operator because the company failed to update its contact information in response to a Jan. 30 announcement.

WBC failed to post applications and proposed service areas on its website even though program guidelines said that would happen July 27. The council said it was "privileged and private information," said Hium. The WBC told Union it was due to “overwhelming response,” said Reno.

By creating ConnectWyoming, the WBC bypassed transparency requirements from an existing state broadband program established by a 2018 broadband law, argued Hium. WBC didn’t have the required “18 months to go back and forth with broadband providers" due to the Dec. 30 deadline, Dorrell countered. "These were emergency rules."

Bodyfelt said WBC gave no public notice on funding decisions made after the August announcement, including transferring a Range project to Visionary, plus a late award for Mountain West Technologies. Dorrell said the board decided these unanimously at public meetings.

Conflicts?

Tongue River and Union raised conflict-of-interest concerns about ConnectWyoming reviewers. WBC’s Broadband Advisory Council includes Visionary’s Worthen and officials from two other companies selected in August for money -- Charter Communications and Silver Star. The latter’s CEO, Allen Hoopes, is a board member of the full business council. WBC assigned $31.2 million to the three companies.

WBC Broadband Manager Ryan Kudera used to work for Dubois Telephone Exchange, which became Range Aug. 4 when it joined with three companies. The council awarded $32 million to them in August, but Range never accepted the money, Chief Government Relations Officer Jason Hendricks told us.

The Broadband Advisory Council didn’t review ConnectWyoming applications, and Hoopes recused himself, responded Dorrell. The broadband group’s chair, Lauren Schoenfeld, was part of the review team, but she has no ISP affiliation, he said. Other reviewers were Kudera, Gannett Peak Technical Services CEO Erin Moore and Brownstein Hyatt attorney Kristin Lee, said Dorrell. He disagreed that funding to providers with officials on the WBC should raise eyebrows because Wyoming has few providers.

"Visionary Broadband and Brian Worthen were not involved in setting the criteria or selection process for the grants,” a Visionary spokesperson said. Charter and Silver Star didn’t comment.

Shifting Maps

Worthen asked why the FCC updated the June 2019 dataset in November after Tongue River and O’Rielly raised concerns. The FCC updated it days after the agency released December 2019 data.

Version 2 shows more coverage and higher speeds by Tongue River than what Visionary viewed earlier, said Worthen. “This whole situation has caused me to believe that these maps are just fluid, and they aren't truly representative of what hard work people have been doing to get bandwidth and broadband out there.”

“The updated June 2019 map does show Tongue River ... data that did not appear at the time of application consideration,” Dorrell said.

“As a matter of course, companies correct their filings, and may also correct prior filings,” emailed an FCC spokesperson. “We don’t keep the outdated maps to avoid causing confusion from people relying on incorrect maps.”