Experts Raise Concerns About Broadband Mapping Process, BEAD Allocations

Broadband mapping experts raised concerns about the FCC’s methodology and processes for developing its new broadband availability maps. During a Wednesday Broadband Breakfast webinar some questioned how the data will affect how NTIA allocates broadband, equity, access and deployment program funding (see 2209060059).

The FCC is making “exactly the same mistakes they made previously” by “going with a proprietary technology” and closed methodology that can’t be peer reviewed, said Sascha Meinrath, Penn State University Palmer Chair in Telecom and X-Lab director. The FCC is “creating the problem that future histories will talk about as the boondoggle of broadband mapping in 2022,” Meinrath said.

The mapping process hasn’t been “transparent” and “the information that’s come out has only led to more discord and more distrust,” said Scott Woods, Ready.net vice president-community engagement and strategic partnerships. “The goal is to connect those who are not connected,” Woods said. “You want to ensure that these vulnerable and marginalized communities understand and believe that what comes out of this is going to be fair.”

Part of the mapping challenge is that there's a “lack of trust” in the process, said George Mason University professor Michael Kleeman, adding he's concerned there may still be people who are “not well served and who could have been if we had done our job collectively as good as possible.” Another concern is that BEAD funding could be delayed by years because of a “series of iterative challenges” to the FCC’s maps and “in the end, people that need service won't be getting it,” Kleeman said (see 2210040024).

Broadband mapping is a “fairly intractable problem,” said Montana Department of Administration Chief Data Officer Adam Carpenter. The problem for his state is that “any challenge data we submit, CostQuest gets to keep with no limitations,” Carpenter said. That “put us in a position where we're either not going to challenge the FCC map” or “we're going to work out some deal where we partially challenge the FCC map where it favors us,” he said. The FCC “needs to realize” that the goal of having an accurate map “is going to fail” because “I don't know any states that didn't, at least in part, lease their fabric data from somebody,” Carpenter said.

Carpenter said his challenges to the map will likely focus on areas that are “are way out there” on the fabric to justify the need for funding. “That's not, I guarantee what the FCC wanted states to do ... and it's a pretty tough position to be in, but we don't have any choice," he said: “The States and all the entities involved in this have essentially been set up to compete with each other for this money, which sort of stifles collaboration in a way that it absolutely shouldn't.”

“What’s still missing is this singular mechanism whereby we can all collaborate and develop in synergy, as opposed to in parallel,” Meinrath said: “We have trusted the ISPs to self-provision broadband data that has consistently been shown to be hyperbolic, overstatements of availability and speeds.” It’s a “travesty” that more than $450 million has been spent on broadband mapping and there's “pretty much nothing functional to show for it,” he said.

NTIA announced earlier this month that it will enter a nearly $50 million contract with CostQuest, which built the FCC’s broadband serviceable location fabric, for data support. It “doesn’t make a lot of sense” for the agency to do so, Woods said, because it already has the national broadband availability map “at its disposal” and a data sharing agreement with the FCC.

“We’ve got to be able to understand the base connectivity for our communities,” Woods said. It’s a “fundamental matter” that NTIA and the FCC are “missing in these convoluted processes,” he said. Kleeman proposed developing a sampling methodology to identify unserved areas by placing hardware devices on "existing networks that could test actual performance and actual quality of service.” States could also collaborate on best practices and standards to “get momentum,” he said.