WTA Urges FCC to Extend and Enhance Current ACAM/CAF-BLS Mechanisms

On August 18, representatives from WTA met with staff from the FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics to discuss the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking regarding the ACAM Broadband Coalition proceeding. WTA urged the FCC to move forward expeditiously with the consideration, adoption and implementation of the contemplated Enhanced ACAM and CAF-BLS/HCLS changes that would increase the service level commitments of most rural local exchange carriers to 100/20 Mbps or more. WTA noted that by obtaining enforceable commitments by participating RLECs to deploy qualifying 100/20 Mbps broadband, the proposed changes would eliminate a major source of potential funding duplication with respect to the BEAD and other recently enacted federal broadband grant programs.