Western Telecommunications Alliance

Today, WTA submitted reply comments to the FCC summarizing the association’s earlier comments on various portions of the National Broadband Plan under development at the agency.  The comments can be found here.

WTA’s Reply Comments

On Friday, January 15th, RUS and NTIA released two Notices of Funds Availability (NOFAs) providing details of the conditions on applying for grants and loans in Round II of the RUS Broadband Infrastructure Program (BIP) and BTOP Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP).

The agencies plan to accept applications from February 16th to March 15th and announce all awards by September 30th.

RUS’s NOFA allocates approximately $2.2 billion in this funding round for broadband infrastructure projects.  NTIA’s NOFA allocates approximately $2.6 billion in this funding round of which approximately $2.35 billion will be made available for infrastructure projects.  In addition, NTIA plans to award at least $150 million of the funding for Public Computer Center projects and at least $100 million for Sustainable Broadband Adoption projects.

The agencies will hold public workshops in the western half of the country in Portland, Reno, Denver, San Antonio, Eureka (MO), and Sioux Falls (SD).  A complete list of public workshops and registration information can be found here.

The NOFAs are below:

BIP NOFA

BTOP NOFA

BTOP Fact Sheet

Today, WTA and OPASTCO released a statement urging the FCC to choose long-term solutions to ensure ubiquitous broadband availability in its National Broadband Plan.  The press release can be viewed here.

This afternoon, WTA submitted comments to the FCC in opposition to the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) petition for rulemaking to restructure the Universal Service Fund.  WTA’s comments recommend that the FCC “reject NCTA’s unwarranted and unsupported attempt to reduce the high-cost support of the small rural local exchange carriers who have been using it most efficiently and effectively to bring emerging broadband services to their rural customers.”  The comments can be viewed here.