Nebraska USF Revamp Sees Disagreements Over Benchmark Speeds, BDC Data Use

Proposed changes to Nebraska's USF program saw disagreements during Nebraska Public Service Commission hearing testimony Tuesday over benchmark speeds for targeting support and what data to use to define unserved and underserved areas. State USF Fund Director Cullen Robbins said the USF Fund recommends maintaining the speed threshold at 25/3 Mbps for targeting support. He said changing that threshold would potentially divert unserved support to areas that might qualify as underserved. Robbins said the fund also recommends changing the structure of payments for the high-cost program. Today it pays on a reimbursement basis, but that has resulted in issues of the fund rising to high levels and legislators wanting to access that money for other purposes. Robbins said a structured payout process, with some funding being paid during the course of a project, might work better. Andy Pollock of Rembolt Ludtke, representing the Rural Nebraska Broadband Alliance, urged transitioning by July 1, 2025, away from USF support for infrastructure that cannot provide 100 Mbps symmetrical speeds. He said there's no reason to continue supporting obsolete infrastructure providing lower speeds. Charter Communications Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Tim Goodwin said that rather than 100 Mbps symmetrical, 100/20 Mbps or 25/3 Mbps would be better benchmarks because those speeds align with other state program standards. Making 100 Mbps symmetrical the benchmark for unserved or underserved would be out of line with numerous state and federal programs, he said. Many cable operators offer 1 Gbps downstream speeds but not 100 Mbps upstream, so with a 100 Mbps symmetrical standard, "you just declared almost all of Lincoln and most of Omaha unserved," he said. Consortia Consulting Director Dan Davis, representing a group of rural LECs, said that a transition to 100 Mbps symmetrical to establish served status would be sound policy, but that 2025 was too soon and a graduated approach should be taken through 2028. Multiple speakers testified in support of using FCC broadband data collection data for determining high-cost support distributions for 2024 and forward. BDC data, “as imperfect as it is,” is still better than the Form 477 alternative, said Charter's Goodwin. However, said Davis, BDC data "is demonstrably inaccurate," overcounting the number of broadband serviceable locations. He said once the data is more accurate, the LECs would support using it for future USF distributions.