'UNDERSERVED' PLACES MUST GET BROADBAND MONEY, DEMOCRATS INSIST

摘要

The stimulus law requires that some broadband money go to underserved areas, Democrats said at an oversight hearing, fighting Republican efforts to steer it to unserved places. "Both unserved and underserved areas are important," said Democrat Rick Boucher of Virginia, chairman of the House Communications Subcommittee. Boucher said "good" definitions of qualifying areas are needed. In defining "underserved," he said, it would be inappropriate to exclude areas "where there is a smattering of broadband service, but where the service is generally absent throughout the community." It would be appropriate to provide support where there's only one broadband provider, so a community gets the benefit of competition. "We should not equate underserved only with the absence of competition," Boucher said. Places where broadband speeds are "inadequate" might qualify, he said. nnRepublicans want the money to go first to areas with completed mapping projects and to unserved areas, said ranking member Cliff Stearns of Florida. Giving money to underserved areas first "could distort the marketplace, either because companies will wait for government funding rather than go forward with their own investments, or will be forced to compete with a government-subsidized competitor," he said. Money should go only to "sustainable" projects, so the government doesn't need to bail out failures in a few years, Stearns said. Accurate mapping is essential to prudent spending of broadband money, said former Telecommunications Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey, D-Mass. "When we complete that map I think we will have gone a long way toward solving the problem." Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., expressed concern about the tight schedule for getting grants out.