Lawmakers, Advocates Eye Other Vehicles to Enact NG-911 Funding

House Democratic leaders reached a deal with 10 wavering moderate caucus members Tuesday to set a Sept. 27 floor vote deadline for HR-3684 in exchange for their support in advancing Senate Concurrent Resolution-14, a blueprint for the pending reconciliation measure (see 2108130001). The chamber passed rules setting up floor consideration of HR-3684 on a 220-212 party-line vote. The resolution also deemed S.Con.Res.-14 passed. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York set a Sept. 15 deadline for the chamber’s Democrats to finish work on its reconciliation package.

House Commerce leaders criticized broadband aspects of the Senate’s HR-3684 version during a Monday Rules Committee hearing on rules setting up floor consideration of the bill and S.Con.Res.-14. House Commerce ranking member Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., said the Senate HR-3684 “does not target funds for deployment to fully unserved parts of America” and “risks wasting billions of dollars in taxpayer money.”

House Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said the measure’s broadband title is “the beginning of a renewed fight to close the digital divide,” but he has “real concerns” about its proposal to reduce the amount of monthly subsidy in an extended version of the FCC’s current emergency broadband benefit to $30 from the current $50 (see 2108100062). Pallone is also “troubled” that the measure would give DOD “the ability to scuttle” some FCC spectrum auctions, which is “bad policy, and it decreases the value of the auction unnecessarily.”

Lawmakers' Interest

Lawmakers we spoke with didn’t have a clear explanation of why the Senate-passed HR-3684 lacked NG-911 money, but most back finding another vehicle for the funding. “It’s an important thing we need to get done somehow,” whether it's via the reconciliation package or another must-pass vehicle later this year, said Senate Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. “We certainly support giving them more funding.”

“I don’t have an answer” why NG-911 money didn’t make it into HR-3684, but investments in the technology were “a priority for me in the House” and “we’ll keep working on that” in the Senate, said Communications Subcommittee Chairman Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M. Providing further funding is “critical to firefighters, police officers and first responders across the country.”

“It would have made sense” to include NG-911 money in the infrastructure package, said Senate Communications ranking member John Thune, R-S.D. Senate Commerce ranking member Roger Wicker, R-Miss., said he would be willing to “look at” other vehicles for including additional funding for the technology.

NG-911 Caucus co-Chair Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., whose past legislative proposals influenced HR-1848’s NG-911 language, said it was the Senate’s prerogative not to include funding for the technology in its version of HR-3684. “On this side we have to work hard to get it in” either via infrastructure legislation, the reconciliation package or another vehicle, she said. “This needs to be a ubiquitous system across" the U.S. “It’s 911, but we’re treating it like it’s” a 411-level priority for updates, Eshoo said. “We’ve only been on this since before” the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“The bipartisan infrastructure framework would benefit from a robust” House Commerce consideration “process that may consider” NG-911 language “and improvements to the other broadband components that may undermine other” existing federal funding programs, said House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Bob Latta, R-Ohio. The existing HR-3684 “has so many hidden costs that Americans are going to be burdened by down the road that I simply cannot support it.” He criticized HR-1848’s NG-911 language during a March hearing (see 2103220063).

Other 'Avenues'

NG-911 advocates weren’t surprised by the absence of funding in HR-3684. Talks among the bipartisan group of senators who wrote the measure came “together so quickly” that no NG-911 language was “ready to go” in time for the Senate to seriously consider it, National Emergency Number Association Director-Government Affairs Dan Henry said: “It’s unfortunate.” He cited the reconciliation package and stand-alone legislation as other potential, but imperfect, vehicles for enacting the money. Henry noted “continued interest” from NG-911 Caucus co-Chair Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., in refiling legislation like her previous proposals in concert with unnamed GOP colleagues.

National Association of State 911 Administrators Executive Director Harriet Rennie-Brown said she’s disappointed but remains “hopeful” lawmakers will enact the money. “If it doesn’t happen” in the infrastructure package “we remain open to other legislative avenues,” she said. It's “going to take a significant amount of funding from the federal government” for NG-911 “to move ahead nationwide … because there are states that simply can't get” deployment “done without it,” Rennie-Brown later emailed: “All states and their [public safety answering points] must move forward together. Significant funding will ensure this occurs and we reach that goal.”

Industry Council for Emergency Response Technologies Executive Director Kim Robert Scovill said he remains hopeful. “One of iCERT’s primary missions is to advocate for full and fair funding for emergency response technologies,” he said: “At this critical time in our history, it is extremely important for our country to transition fully nationwide to new NG-911 technology, and we believe that there is broad bipartisan support in Congress for providing the funds to make that happen. We are optimistic that Congress will pass … legislation this year.”

“It’s indeed unfortunate that NG-911 doesn't appear to be making its way into” the infrastructure package, said Alan Tilles of Shulman Rogers. “Public safety communications infrastructure is unquestionably of utmost importance to the security and safety of every other piece of infrastructure supported in” HR-3684. “Given the difficulty of passing any legislation, we hope that NG-911 funding won't be left as an orphan sitting at the side of new or repaired bridges and highways,” he said.

NENA's Henry and others haven’t completely discounted the possibility that lawmakers will add the NG-911 money into the infrastructure package if the House passes differing language and a conference committee must negotiate a deal. Those dynamics remain a “black box” for now, Henry said: Both a conference committee on the infrastructure package and the budget reconciliation process have a potential to result in a simple appropriation of NG-911 funding sans any language to update the existing NTIA-administered grant program.

Language Agreement

NENA and other stakeholders have “done a ton of work getting to consensus” on policy language in HR-1848 after earlier disagreements, Henry said. But “we’re happy with” the existing NTIA NG-911 program and not including updates as envisioned in HR-1848 “wouldn’t break” it. He described the stakeholders’ deal as an agreement in principle but cautioned House Commerce hasn’t finalized how that translates into legislative language. “We feel good about the principles that we’ve agreed on,” Henry said.

“We’ve gotten to a point where public safety” stakeholders like APCO and NENA are “aligned” on NG-911 policy, so “by the time we see final language,” the community will be able to “rally behind it and support it, whatever vehicle congressional staff decides is best,” said NG911 Institute Executive Director Wesley Wright. NENA and NASNA claimed HR-1848’s language could impinge NG-911 rollout; APCO backed the bill as is (see 2104080003).

Other lawyers who are active on public safety issues said they’re not hopeful Congress will have the political will to focus on NG-911, given priorities for the infrastructure and reconciliation packages.

“At some point there's going to be an effort to address the funding issue,” but it may come in the form of redirecting unspent money from COVID-19 aid measures, said former FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly. “I just don't see a conference happening” on infrastructure legislation “given the delicate nature” of the bipartisan work to shape the Senate version of HR-3684 and the additional time that chamber would need to pass any House changes to the measure.