News
Industry leaders hold out hope for the next version of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), albeit one with changes.
By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities
Broadband is one of the last remaining, truly bipartisan issues, according to Chip Pickering, the CEO of Incompas.
Pickering, who was joined by a panel of executives to kick off Broadband Communities Summit West in San Diego, said there might be a movement in Congress to restore and modernize broadband subsidies to help low-income earners afford services.
“It is a national consensus and commitment of connecting every American,” said Pickering, who also served for 12 years in Congress representing Mississippi’s 3rd congressional district.
Pickering said direct appropriations could be an answer to modernizing the Universal Service Fund, which has come under siege in recent court rulings, and he held out hope for a renewed effort to restore the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP).
Brian Worthen, the CEO of Visionary Communications, said he knew the ACP would not result in new networks.
“Anytime you roll out a program, it can’t have a sunset,” Worthen said. “If it has a big runway, people will build networks around it.”
Worthen elaborated on the need for a program like the ACP to exist.
“You can’t, as a provider, build entirely to low-income areas because your take rate is 10, 15, 20 percent less than a more affluent area,” he said.
Worthen also said his company doesn’t engage in a process known as redlining.
“When we go into a community that only has 2,500 homes we’ve got to build to all 2,500,” he said.
He said the next affordable internet program, if there is one, should take an approach of encouraging companies to build networks so it isn’t just “soaked up by people that have a network already.”
Dane Jasper, the executive director and co-founder of Sonic, said he experienced people refusing to purchase internet subscriptions because of the ACP’s uncertain future.
“We saw a lot of skepticism from the public,” Jasper said. “We would literally knock on doors and say ‘we’re delivering 10 gigabit symmetric fiber and a free Wi-Fi router, and it’s paid for by this $30 subsidy.'”
He said many people would respond by asking, “what’s the catch?”
According to Jasper, when it was explained that the program has a sunset date many would refuse to participate in fear that they’d be paying a full rate before long.
“Predictability and certainty is not always delivered from Washington,” Pickering added.
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