GAO report supports broadband stimulus goals, coordination needed

On June 10, 2009, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Henry Waxman, Communications, Technology, and the Internet Subcommittee Chair Rick Boucher, and Congressman Zachary Space released the Government Accountability Office (“GAO”) report entitled Broadband Deployment Plan Should Include Performance Goals and Measures to Guide Federal Investment.” The Report found that despite the efforts of the market-based policies of the previous Administration to deploy broadband, gaps remain, primarily in rural areas. Because of limited profit potential, investments may be targeted to other more profitable areas, regions or countries.

The GAO noted that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provided more than $7 billion to the Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (“NTIA”), the FCC, and the Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development Utilities Program, to map broadband infrastructure in the United States, develop a plan for broadband deployment, and issue loans and grants to fund broadband access and availability in rural areas. “This funding,” found the GAO, “will greatly increase the potential for achieving universal access, but overlap in responsibilities for these new broadband initiatives makes coordination among the agencies important to avoid fragmentation and duplication.” It added that “[t]hese efforts will help guide federal involvement in deploying broadband in the coming years. Additionally, the efforts complement each other.”