Historic Preservation Council Provides Updated Siting Guidance

The Advisory Council for Historic Preservation (ACHP) Thursday released an update to its 2017 program comment, aimed at speeding the approval of 5G and other deployments under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA). The agreement wraps in changes including those in the FCC’s 2020 order addressing equipment compound expansions as part of collocation (see 2010270043), industry officials said, noting it's largely an extension of prior decisions. The program comment also now applies to every federal agency, a change from the 2017 document. “The purpose of the amendment is to assist federal agencies in efficiently permitting and approving the deployment of wired and wireless next generation technologies of communications infrastructure, including 5G, to connect all communities with reliable, high-speed Internet,” the revised program comment says: “The Program Comment provides an alternative way for federal agencies to comply with Section 106 to take into account the effects of undertakings under its scope on historic properties and afford the ACHP a reasonable opportunity to comment on them.” ACHP notes the document comes as companies start to deploy broadband using $65 billion provided under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and was updated at the request of the NTIA. “All wireless deployments start with a permitting application, but too often our enhanced connectivity goals are quickly ensnared in red tape,” emailed Wireless Infrastructure Association President Patrick Halley. By amending the comment “to apply across the federal ecosystem, these agencies have taken a critical step today for increasing predictability in federal broadband permitting,” he said. The collaborative effort is “the kind of action we need to hasten broadband deployment by ensuring our permitting policies are more predictable, proportionate, and transparent across the board,” Halley said. “It’s crucial to speed up the permitting process and lower barriers to broadband buildout, especially as more federal deployment funding dollars start to flow,” said USTelecom President Jonathan Spalter.