The Treasury Department approved about $158 million in Capital Projects Fund support Wednesday for Puerto Rico to build broadband infrastructure and multipurpose community facilities. The funding will support two efforts. It will fund the "resiliency and reliability of the island's high speed internet access" through a submarine cable resiliency program, said Capital Projects Fund Director Joseph Wender during a roundtable. The program will include building a new submarine fiber route to Puerto Rico from the Dominican Republic and U.S. Virgin Islands to create three cable landing stations, Wender said. The new support will also fund a multipurpose community technology center program for public access to the internet and technology. "We're certainly headed in the right direction," said Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi (D): "These funds will make a huge difference in Puerto Rico since they will help us ensure that our island has the necessary broadband infrastructure and that all our citizens have the internet access, tech assistance, and training they need and deserve."
It’s good for the federal government to fund chips in states that have already spent their own money, rather than trying to spread money across every area that hasn’t invested in semiconductors, said panelists on an Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) webinar Wednesday. State officials discussed their roles in helping the Chips Act succeed. “Piggybacking on the work we’re doing is what is going to see us succeed,” said Kevin Younis, New York Empire State Development chief operating officer. “There has to be strategic cluster-based investments [or] we’re not going to succeed. With the peanut butter spread over the whole sandwich, you won’t taste it.” States can help the Chips Act succeed by addressing the workforce gap and cutting red tape, said David Isaacs, Semiconductor Industry Association vice president-government affairs. "There's a huge gap throughout the economy in skilled workers," with the semiconductor industry “just a small slice of the overall pie,” said Isaacs. An SIA report said about 58% of needed jobs may not be filled, including engineers, computer scientists and technicians, he said: “We need to see federal-state partnerships with industry and education to train these workers.” Also, states can play an important role speeding projects by streamlining permitting and other regulatory approval processes, he said. Arizona Commerce Authority CEO Sandra Watson said her state is “constantly having conversations about the regulatory environment and how to make that easier on industry.”
Kentucky granted $196 million to bring broadband to more than 42,600 homes and businesses, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) said Tuesday. The governor’s office said the 56 grants under the state’s Better Internet program will fund fiber in 46 counties with money from the federal American Rescue Plan Act. ISPs will provide more than $190 million in matching funds, it said. North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D) Tuesday announced $22 million to connect about 6,000 households and more than 160 businesses to broadband. Charter Communications was the private ISP partner in half the 14 counties that won grants through the state's Completing Access to Broadband (CAB) program.
State senators chose not to advance a bill that would have limited California rules for the broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program. The Senate Appropriations Committee on Friday held the Assembly-passed AB-662, which was opposed by local and consumer advocates (see 2308170044). Assembly Communications Committee Chair Tasha Boerner said earlier her bill’s purpose was to bring accountability to the California Public Utilities Commission. The Democrat didn’t comment Tuesday. The committee also held AB-296 on 911 public education and AB-1546, which would have extended the statute of limitations for privacy claims brought by the state attorney general. AB-1546 sponsor Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel (D) said, “We’re disappointed that the bill won’t be moving forward this year, but are committed to continuing our effort to protect Californians' privacy rights.” The panel voted 7-0 to advance AB-286 on adjusting state broadband map requirements to the Senate floor. It also unanimously cleared AB-1065, which would explicitly authorize wireless broadband providers to apply for CASF federal funding account grants. Also Friday, the Assembly Appropriations Committee voted 16-0 for SB-60, which would explicitly authorize wireless broadband providers to apply for CASF federal funding account grants. The panel also unanimously advanced to the floor SB-74 to prohibit high-risk social media apps that, like TikTok, are at least partly owned by an entity or “country of concern.”
The California Public Utilities Commission expects to finish updating California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) rules within 18 months, Commissioner Darcie Houck said in a scoping memo Tuesday (docket R.20-08-021). The CPUC expects to post a proposed decision on staff’s revised proposal on the broadband loan loss reserve fund in Q3 or Q4 this year, said the memo. In the same time frame, the CPUC plans to seek comments on proposed changes to the public housing account and line extension pilot program, it said. Expect proposed decisions on those issues in Q1 or Q2 2024, it said. In a separate Tuesday ruling, CPUC Administrative Law Judge Stephanie Wang sought comments by Sept. 26 on a staff proposal for a permanent foster youth program within the California LifeLine program. Replies are due Oct. 13. The CPUC authorized a pilot program in 2019 and in subsequent rulings extended the pilot through July 31, 2024.
Nebraska suffered back-to-back 911 outages, but services are now restored. Fiber cuts led to Lumen 911 outages statewide Thursday night to Friday morning (see 2309010021). Then, the Nebraska Public Service Commission said a fire at a Windstream data center in Lincoln disrupted 911 services at some southeast Nebraska public safety answering points (PSAPs) from Saturday night to Sunday morning. Four counties lost 911 service and others experienced other issues, said the PSC: The incident affected 911 centers that contract with Windstream for their local or regional networks. “Any investigation will look into what led to this disruption in 911 service and will focus on available backup systems and identifying solutions moving forward to mitigate future issues,” Nebraska 911 Director David Sankey said. Southeast PSAPs “are working with officials from the Public Service Commission and Windstream to prevent such an outage from occurring in the future,” the Southeast 911 Committee said Sunday. The Lumen and Windstream incidents were “entirely separate, just coincidental timing,” a Nebraska PSC spokesperson said Tuesday. A Windstream spokesperson said an electrical fire at its Lincoln switch location cut commercial power to the facility Friday. "An on-site generator took over supporting the three switches in the building, and we began efforts to restore commercial power. The generator operated until there was a fault, and we switched to batteries. After supporting the switches for an extended period of time, the batteries dropped to dangerously low voltage levels, and our technical team made the decision to shut down one of the three switches." That "caused a service interruption for a subset of our customers in Nebraska," the Windstream rep said. "When power was restored, we reactivated the switch, a process that took several hours and restored service to the impacted customers in phases." He said the "event was unrelated to anything occurring on any other carrier’s network." In Minnesota, the state’s public safety department said frequent and “increasingly prolonged CenturyLink phone outages” are affecting 911. The Lumen company’s “reporting is often incomplete and thus unactionable,” the department said in docket 20-432. “CenturyLink outages are increasingly on the rise,” with seven in 2017 increasing to 29 in 2022, it said. “Many of these outages lasted several days.” Lumen didn’t comment.
Don’t dismiss an investigation into a USF surcharges dispute between T-Mobile’s MetroPCS and the California Public Utilities Commission, the CPUC Consumer Protection and Enforcement Division (CPED) urged the commission Thursday. T-Mobile sought dismissal due to completion of a related court case at the U.S. District Court for Northern California where MetroPCS won judgment against the CPUC (see 2308170063). The carrier’s motion is premature because issues in the first track of the CPUC investigation are independent of federal litigation, said CPED in docket I.22-04-005. Also, the CPUC still has time to appeal the court’s decision addressing second track issues, the division said.
Google Fiber has multiple rollouts planned for the Nashville area, Government and Community Affairs Manager Ryun Jackson blogged last week. He said construction in Murfreesboro should begin early next year, with start of service later in the year. The Murfreesboro announcement follows Google Fiber beginning service in Smyrna and announcing plans to bring service to Franklin.
Lumen restored Nebraska 911 service after fiber cuts led to outages statewide from Thursday night to Friday morning. “Our team worked throughout the night to fix the issue” and “the system is now fully functional,” a Lumen spokesperson said Friday. Nebraska experienced regional 911 system failures statewide Thursday evening, Republican Gov. Jim Pillen’s office said in a statement that night. The state's 911 system went down at about 7:30 p.m. CDT Thursday, Nebraska’s Douglas County said Thursday on Facebook. The state’s most populous county posted Friday at 8:10 a.m. CDT that services were restored. “Sarpy County’s 911 network provider experienced what they described as a network event that disrupted calls to 911 across Nebraska,” Sarpy County said Friday. “The network provider is investigating the source of the disruption.” Lumen said the outage began at 7:05 p.m. CDT Thursday and service was restored at 5:30 a.m. CDT Friday, said the Nebraska Public Service Commission: The PSC is working with the carrier to determine what caused the cut. The FCC didn’t comment.
Dish Wireless filed an amended petition for eligible telecom carrier designation Wednesday at the Texas Public Utility Commission (docket 54475). Administrative Law Judge Christina Denmark in July required the company to correctly show the state’s rural and non-rural locations. Dish said it filed the amended petition mainly to address the ALJ’s concerns. Denmark directed PUC staff last month to review Dish’s amended petition by Sept. 20 (see 2308040023).