Strickling Touts ‘Tangible’ BTOP Successes, Says NTIA is Fulfilling Pledges

Don’t doubt the success of the federal government’s wide-ranging broadband stimulus launched two years ago, program officials said. NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling gathered representatives from four of its 224 Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grantees at the Brookings Institution Wednesday to discuss different projects’ virtues, lessons learned and as Strickling said, “to demonstrate the successes” and “humanize” the $4-billion stimulus investment with “tangible” details of how the different projects work. The message glossed over past concerns, such as overbuilding (CD Sept 27 p6), accountability (CD Nov 15 p15) and, in the past year, partial suspension of eight of the program’s largest infrastructure grantees -- seven in May due to FirstNet compatibility concerns (CD Aug 7 p1) and one in December (CD Dec 10 p6) due to compliance problems. The event coincided with NTIA’s 15th quarterly BTOP update to Congress (http://xrl.us/boa3z2).

Strickling’s faith in the program was unyielding throughout a speech, panel and in answers to questions. “I could bring in any one of our grantees and they could tell these stories,” he said, referring to the other grantee representatives present and the catalogue of names he had presented during the talk. NTIA has delivered on pledges it made three years ago, he said. With photos to illustrate his points, his speech emphasized individuals who have benefited from the grants, from teachers to doctors to a former prisoner who credits skills learned in a digital literacy class. The successes fall across all the states and have big potential, especially for education and health, according to Strickling: “These investments have the potential to reshape our nation.”

Grantees were designed to be sustainable once the three-year grants end in the next year, he said, citing NTIA’s specific attention to sustainability plans in the grant application process. “It’s something we expect from all of our grantees,” he said. BTOP was meant to “spur” private industry, not compete with it, Strickling said: “I don’t think there’s any doubt that the program has helped private industry generally.” He mentioned more than 500 companies that have signed interconnection agreements to join BTOP-funded networks. He acknowledged some concerns “from the carrier community” but said the program is designed to be a “win-win” for all.

Grantee representatives praised BTOP but stressed the steep learning curves involved and the significance of education as well as access. “I kind of feel like the Forrest Gump of broadband,” said North Georgia Network Board Member Bruce Abraham, pointing to the long road that brought him there as a technology advocate, in contrast to past ignorance: “I didn’t know fiber from muffins!” University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences Director Curtis Lowery, in turn, called himself Bubba, friend to Forrest Gump in the 1994 movie showing a simple man’s rise. Abraham described how his network aided the record-keeping of hospitals, enabled companies to better serve clients, allowed local merchants to sell dolls online and more. “Our churches can now broadcast their services to homebound members,” he said. “We have raised expectations by bringing this infrastructure to the region.” Lowery credited BTOP with helping expand rural Arkansans’ access to healthcare. Axiom Technologies Chief Executive Officer Susan Corbett described how the digital literacy outreach in Maine has allowed farmers and fishers who had “never turned on a computer before” to learn how and begin “blogging, Facebooking” and embracing business opportunities. CFY President Mark Malaspina spoke of how the stimulus dollars helped his program drive broadband adoption among low-income families.

Grantees deployed more than 78,000 network miles collectively as of fiscal year 2012, 6,500 in the latest quarter of July 1 to Sept. 30, NTIA’s report said. Its goal was 50,000 by then. It also exceeded its goal of connecting more than 10,000 community anchor institutions, reaching 11,200 in 45 states and territories, it said. Digital literacy classes helped 510,000 households and 12,000 businesses subscribe to broadband as of September, according to 37 recipients NTIA cited in its report. It added 38,600 computer workstations to 2,600 computer centers across 1,500 communities.

But a small fraction of grantees still run into overbuilding problems, their work overlapping with other federally-funded projects. Three percent of “instances of potential overlap” remain unresolved as of September 2012, NTIA said, the same number that NTIA said existed in June 2012 in its 14th report to Congress. NTIA hopes to resolve these concerns through “ongoing negotiations with recipients seeking ways to leverage the respective investments, such as joint-build solutions,” it said. Of the seven partially suspended public safety infrastructure grantees, NTIA noted the FirstNet board is investigating “how these projects can potentially support the development of the nationwide network” but provided no details of when and how they may be reactivated or whether they'll need an extension of time or more money after seven months idle. The report didn’t mention EAGLE-Net, a $100-million grantee suspended for unrelated issues in December. NTIA has also begun integrating the Commerce Department Inspector General’s recommendations on the match review process and sharing information with grantees “regarding recordkeeping and internal controls for cash distribution,” it said.

Five grantees already closed out with NTIA in this last quarter as the agency “refines” the closeout process, it said. The recipients include Michigan State University, the New York Department of Labor, the Santa Fe Civic Housing Authority, the City of Williamstown and the Georgia Partnership for Telehealth, Inc. Projects shouldn’t need ongoing sources of funding, Strickling said, expressing doubt that recipients should need to benefit from what he called the “closed system” of the USF or a national infrastructure bank. “We're close to breaking even,” Abraham said of the Georgia network. Corbett described a recent infusion of private funding that will keep work in Maine going for two more years as well as a software the grantee developed, available nationwide, that may generate money. NTIA plans to release a toolkit that will share lessons learned on broadband adoption in inner city, rural or ethnic communities, Strickling said.

"We need to continue on with these ideas and with these learnings,” Strickling said of BTOP thus far. If the government were ever to open up more funding, “we'd certainly be prepared and eager” to facilitate that, he said. Education is “an absolutely key area” that calls for “a national effort” and private-public partnerships, he added, describing the need for “ramping up bandwidth in our schools” beyond what BTOP has done.