Opinion: Why is rural America being left behind in Lifeline reform?
By Betsy Huber
Major portions of
rural America have no access to broadband. Fewer than one in five Americans (17 percent) can’t
access what the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) defines as broadband, but
that level is three times higher – a whopping 53% -- when it comes to rural
America. And what about those parts of
rural America with broadband access?
According to the 2015 State of the Internet Report, the average
connection speed in many rural areas is slower than those in Estonia, Uruguay,
and Thailand.
That’s why the
millions of us who live in rural America can muster no more than two cheers for
the Lifeline Reform plan recently drafted by the FCC that shifts the focus of
the federal Lifeline program to broadband. It’s a good move that makes sense in the long
term, but it doesn’t have to be done with such haste that it severs the wireless
Lifeline now helping millions of low-income residents in rural America.
The problem is that
the FCC timetable for shifting Lifeline from a wireless focus to “broadband
only” is out of sync with the reality of the availability of adequate broadband
in rural America. The FCC wants to start
a phase out of wireless Lifeline almost immediately and then hang up on it
altogether in 2019. After that, Lifeline would only subsidize
broadband and landline phone service.
That’s the wrong
timetable for rural America. The FCC’s
own data show that as many as 22 million rural Americans lack access to connections
to broadband at download speeds of 25 megabits per second (mbps). The Commission also has reported that one in
five rural Americans lacks access at the even slower speeds of 4 mbps. The access gap is even worse for people
living on Native American tribal lands, where the lack of access surges to
63 percent.
While there is much
to admire in the FCC’s plan for a $9.25-a-month subsidy focused over time on
broadband, the truth is that it probably won’t result in one new mile of
broadband cabling in rural America. All
signs are that our communities of non-urban areas will lag for decades when it
comes to access to essential broadband. The
FCC knows this and so the unfortunate appearance is that the Commission’s
current Lifeline reform plan is a calculated slight to rural concerns.
In less than 45
months the current wireless Lifeline service will vanish. For rural Americans who have no way to use a
broadband subsidy, the demise of Lifeline by 2019 will mean that they are
effectively cut out of the program.
Their only sin: living in rural
America.
To make matters
even worse for those living in rural America, the FCC wants to impose minimum standards
on wireless Lifeline that almost certainly would force a co-pay arrangement for
subscribers. This would make participation
in the program burdensome, if not completely unaffordable, for many low-income
rural dwellers. Many of the poorest people with the least
access to help live in rural America, these are not consumers who will be able
to continue using Lifeline if they have to pony up cash that they just don’t
have.
By phasing out
wireless Lifeline and offering only a broadband program they can’t access, rural
Americans will not be helped by Lifeline reform. Instead, will we rural Americans become the
first and perhaps largest group of disconnected victims of the reforms? I ask
the FCC: What good is Lifeline reform in
rural America if broadband is not available now and you are killing wireless
service?
Betsy Huber is
President of The National Grange
#30
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