Inouye Supports Additional Funding for Tribal Broadband

Inouye asked whether the FCC has enough money for its Office of Native Affairs and Policy. He said he has been told that the office is “overworked” and understaffed. “If you need more money, we'll get it for you,” Inouye said. The FCC office’s chief, Geoffrey Blackwell, said the office is an improvement from the previous situation, when he was the only advocate for tribal areas at the commission. Blackwell promised to get back to Inouye about the office’s funding.

Commerce Committee members expressed alarm particularly about regulations slowing broadband buildout in tribal areas. Sacred Wind CEO John Badal said his company could deploy broadband twice as fast if not for the difficulty of getting permits to build on federal lands. He also complained about restrictive pole-attachment rules. The Bureau of Indian Affairs has been especially difficult to work with, Badal said. Inouye responded that the bureau should be promoting tribal interests. “I'm going to be chatting with them,” he said. Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, said taking years to approve attaching one more line to a pole seems like a waste of time and resources.

"Creative” funding measures are necessary with the cost-consciousness current in Washington, Inouye said at the hearing. Broadband funding in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was only a “small down payment” on what’s needed, he said. Native Americans have had less access to telecom than any other segment of the U.S. population, Inouye said. The lack of broadband in tribal areas “cries out for our attention,” Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said in a written statement.

Congress should create a Native Nations Broadband Fund, as the National Broadband Plan recommended, said Alapaki Nahale-a, chairman of the Hawaiian Homeland Department. Broadband deployment supported by the fund would accelerate the state’s ability to address social, health, education and economic challenges, Nahale-a said. Native Public Media CEO Loris Ann Taylor also supported the proposed fund. Money should be available for both deployment and digital literacy efforts, she said.

USF should be expanded to support broadband, said Myron Naneng, president of the Association of Village Council Presidents. USF has brought phone service to every home, he said. But in rural Alaska, “there is no choice of provider and the connection is weak,” said Naneng. Many places lack cellphone and Internet services, he said, and they're poor elsewhere. Begich agreed that broadband speeds are unacceptably slow in Alaska.

While shifting USF to broadband, policymakers should not cut off support for conventional telephone service, which is still important on tribal lands, Taylor said. She also cautioned against proposed cuts in funding to NTIA’s Public Telecommunications Facilities Program. Without the program, many construction permits for Native American radio stations could expire, she said.

Unused Recovery Act funds returned to NTIA and RUS should be repurposed for broadband deployment to tribal lands, Taylor said. Meanwhile, across Capitol Hill, the House Commerce Committee considered a bill to ensure that unused broadband stimulus money goes back to the U.S. Treasury instead of being spent for other purposes. (See separate report in this issue).

"The lack of telecommunications services in Indian Country is alarming,” Blackwell said in written testimony. “Changing our rules alone is not enough,” he said. “We cannot -- and will not -- be able to only sit here in Washington, make minor tweaks to our rules to do what we think will work, and wait to see if they do. Complex problems dictate the need for new policies and procedures, and well-thought-out solutions.” The FCC took up several tribal broadband issues at its March meeting, Blackwell noted.

A top priority for the FCC “is to overhaul, update, and increase the collaborative value” of the Indian Telecom Initiatives program, Blackwell said. The commission also plans to create a federal interagency broadband working group, he said. “With a new interagency initiative on Native broadband, the federal government can coordinate both internally and directly with Native Nations on broadband-related policies, programs, and initiatives.” The FCC also plans to update its Spectrum Dashboard to help tribal communications planners, he said.

The hearing was sparsely attended by committee members. Inouye chaired the hearing in Rockefeller’s absence, and the only others who asked questions were Begich and Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M. No Republicans were present most of the hearing.