WTA Board Member, John Stuart, Provides Congressional Testimony on Broadband Permitting Reform

Today, John Stuart, President and CEO of MTE Communications in Midvale, ID and WTA Board Member testified at a hearing held by the House Natural Resources Committee’s Subcommittee on Federal Lands in favor of H.R. 4141, legislation to exempt broadband projects that use existing rights-of-way and previously permitted federal lands from National Environmental Policy Act and National Historic Preservation Act review.

In his testimony, John stated that “MTE, and companies like it, serve rural America because the people who work for them live there. We want to ensure our families, friends, and neighbors have the same communications that people living in urban America have. We also care about our natural environment and historic preservation. However, lacking reform, current implementation of our environmental protection and historical preservation laws threatens to delay and add great cost to the goal of getting broadband to every American household.”