WTA Discusses Enhanced ACAM Order with FCC
On August 17, representatives from WTA met with staff from the FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau to discuss several topics related to the Enhanced ACAM (E-ACAM) Order approved in July.
WTA believes that RUS ReConnect grants should be deemed to be complementary to, rather than duplicative of, E-ACAM support because they are intended to deploy high-speed broadband in the most remote and very high-cost portions of the United States (areas likely to otherwise remain unserved without both ReConnect funding and federal high-cost support).
How the Order appears to treat ReConnect awards that are “50% grant and 50% loan” and those that are “75% grant and 25% match” is undetermined. WTA urged the FCC that treat ReConnect grant/loan combinations and 75% grant/25% match awards as complementary so that the locations involved would be eligible for E- ACAM support. Areas that have received “enforceable commitments” for ReConnect awards that are 100% grant should be eligible for the same 50%-to-75% amount of current ACAM support offered to carriers for locations where they have completed 100/20 Mbps broadband deployment.
WTA also recommended the Bureau take a further look at the viability of the use of resold satellite services (including voice service latency and performance testing difficulties) and whether omitting to include it as an option to serve very remote locations would discourage E-ACAM participation by ILECs and whether those remote locations are unlikely to otherwise be served by other federal and state broadband deployment programs.
