RLECs Continue Push for FCC to 'Fully Fund" Rural USF to Close to $3 Billion by 2026
Rural telco groups pressed the FCC to increase their annual high-cost subsidy support. WTA said a "fully-funded" rate-of-return (RoR) USF budget would start at $2.43 billion in 2018 and gradually increase to $2.975 billion in 2026. "This increase is warranted,…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
in major part, because of the substantial construction and operating cost increases that have occurred during the course of the transformation of the predominately voice and lower-speed broadband network of 2011 into today’s higher and higher-speed broadband network," said WTA's filing posted in docket 10-90 Friday on a meeting with Commissioner Mike O'Rielly and an aide. Similar filings were posted on meetings with aides to Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioners Brendan Carr and Jessica Rosenworcel (here, here, here). GVNW Consulting cited NTCA estimates that $2.55 billion will be needed in 2018, with budget demand growing to about $2.8 billion by 2026, said filings on meetings with all four commissioners (here, here). It also said "the vast majority of comments" opposed using reverse auctions to distribute USF support. In a meeting with an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, ITTA urged the FCC to "fully fund separate budgets" for the two RoR segments of the high-cost program: the Alternative Connect America Cost Model program and legacy support mechanisms.