Continuing Resolution Would Fund BTOP Oversight Until March
A continuing resolution approved Tuesday by the Senate includes broadband oversight money sought by the NTIA. It also prevents a spike in Universal Service Fund contributions by extending an exemption of the USF from a Civil War-era law. The resolution keeps the government running until March 4. The drama over broadband funding and the last-minute, temporary nature of the fix raised concerns about whether the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program can work long term.
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The Senate adopted the resolution 79-16 after having voted 82-14 to end debate. The House hadn’t approved the measure by our deadline, but a Democratic leadership aide said it probably would late Tuesday night. House leaders expected to take up the bill “soon after” Senate passage, said another senior House Democratic aide.
Section 148 would set NTIA funding at $40.6 million, including money for oversight of BTOP. The agency has about $20 million now, and President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget had proposed an additional $24 million for BTOP oversight. OMB had authorized the NTIA to spend more than $20 million while Congress worked out appropriations, so the agency would have had to make serious cuts without the continuing resolution. Providing $40.6 million will “prevent layoffs that would cause the agency to cease almost all operations,” the Senate Appropriations Committee said. The NTIA declined to comment.
Midsize telcos are concerned about BTOP’s prospects, since Congress had to rush in at the last minute to keep it going, said Paul Raak, vice president of the Independent Telephone & Telecommunications Alliance. The issue will come up again in March, when the continuing resolution expires. It will be decided by a new Congress expected to be more resistant to spending.
Section 155 extends the expiration date of the Universal Service Antideficiency Temporary Suspension Act through 2011, from the end of this year. The law exempted USF from the 120-year-old Anti-Deficiency Act, meant to prevent the government from taking in money without stating a reason. Extending the exemption has been an annual tradition since the GAO in 2005 ruled that the older act applied to USF. The extension in the resolution “prevents the need for a rate increase on telecommunications companies that would be passed on to consumers in the form of higher charges to consumer phone bills,” Senate Appropriations said.
The yearly exemption “has made it possible for small and rural companies” to deploy broadband in rural areas, said Catherine Moyer, chairwoman of the Organization for the Promotion and Advancement of Small Telecommunications Companies. The exemption is “crucial to ensuring that consumers everywhere have affordable and comparable telephone service without paying additional universal service contribution fees simply to meet an administrative accounting rule.” The National Telecommunications Cooperative Association also praised the exemption. But it seeks a “permanent fix that ensures future investment in the lives and communities of Americans across the country is not interrupted,” said an NTCA spokeswoman.