Cammack Eyes DHS, Other Potential 'Offsets' for NG911 Funding

During a hearing Tuesday, House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone of New Jersey and other Communications Subcommittee Democrats criticized Republicans for not allocating spectrum proceeds to pay for NG911 and other telecom projects. Democrats also used the hearing as a forum to lambaste Republicans for rescinding CPB’s FY 2026 and FY 2027 funding (see 2509090064). Meanwhile, House Communications members eyed potential changes to FirstNet as part of a bid to renew the public safety broadband network’s authority before its current February 2027 sunset.

Cammack said she “could very easily see [NG911 funding move via the] traditional appropriations process,” although it’s unlikely to advance that way during the current FY 2026 cycle. “We're looking at different ways that we could include it … in whatever must-pass vehicle we can attach it to,” she told us. “We know where we can pull dollars from for offsets” and benefit from at least having bipartisan agreement that NG911 is necessary. “There are some opportunities” to offset NG911 funding by shifting “some dollars around” from some DHS initiatives, Cammack said. “There are plenty of programs” Congress could target, and even the 2018 report from the NTIA and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which serves as the current estimate of needed NG911 funding (see 1810050051), suggested some potential offsets.

Cammack told us she fully supports a proposal from House Communications Chairman Richard Hudson, R-N.C., to reassess the amount of money localities need to pay for NG911 upgrades, given that the current NTIA/NHTSA study is now seven years old (see 2505140062). “Costs are different, [and] a study with a longer lens could actually give us a bit of a different perspective of how we invest now and where we can go in the future,” she said. Cammack noted that the federal government can expedite a new study to avoid a potential yearslong delay in allocating NG911 money, a concern raised recently by the National Emergency Number Association and others (see 2507080065).

Hearing Debate

Pallone was one of multiple House Communications Democrats who chided Republicans for reversing course away from a “bipartisan agreement” to pay for NG911 with auction revenue in the Spectrum Auction Reauthorization Act, which the Commerce Committee advanced in 2023 (see 2305240069). That measure would have allocated up to $14.8 billion to NG911. Pallone argued that Republicans “abandoned” that consensus in July by passing the budget reconciliation package, previously known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, with spectrum language that obligated all future revenue to pay for “tax breaks for billionaires and big corporations” (see 2507080065). House Communications ranking member Doris Matsui, D-Calif., said Republicans wanted to “fund tax breaks for the wealthy [instead of using] those funds for [NG911] nationwide ... and provide faster, more accurate emergency responses.”

Hudson and other Republicans largely sidestepped discussing how to move forward on NG911 funding during Tuesday's hearing. Hudson said he continues to support funding for NG911 and acknowledged that “funding is an issue, but are there other things Congress can do to sort of help cut through and make this nationwide deployment possible?” Rep. Jay Obernolte, R-Calif., noted that “everyone here on the dais would completely agree that this is something we have to put across the finish line,” but he then questioned advocates’ view that the federal government needs to provide $15 billion for NG911. “These call centers … already have computers, [and] from my standpoint, NG911 is just software,” he said. “How on earth does it cost $15 billion? Where does that money go if it's just software that we’re talking about?”

Former NENA CEO Brian Fontes repeatedly emphasized the importance of swift federal NG911 funding and his opposition to a new federal cost estimate for the technology. He countered Obernolte that NG911 “isn’t just software. Many of our 911 centers don’t even have broadband capabilities, so there’s that connectivity issue that has to take place. There also has to be the technology in the centers to enable the utilization of data and information coming in.” Fontes separately told Pallone that there are still “opportunities” for Congress to obligate spectrum revenue for NG911 for frequencies “that may not fall within the purview” of the pipeline language in the reconciliation package.

Meanwhile, in a letter to House Commerce Chairman Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., and other panel leaders, Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials President Jack Varnado said that Congress should enact “legislation to establish a federal grant program supporting the transition” to NG911.

Also at the hearing, San Bernardino, California, Sheriff Shannon Dicus urged Congress to adopt a “national standard” for governing NG911 to overcome “governance and policy issues” inherent in localities having differing structures. He advocated for “making sure we’re able to build out that critical infrastructure so that we can all communicate across” jurisdictional lines.