NTIA has thus far approved initial BEAD proposals from 51 states and territories, including the District of Columbia, but it’s still not clear when those states will finally get to the point where they can start distributing money to fund broadband deployments.
Impact: The initial proposals include Volume I and Volume II and well as NTIA feedback on each volume prior to official approval from the agency. Of the approved states, Louisiana (the first to gain approval), Montana, West Virginia, Nevada, and Colorado are reportedly well ahead of the pack and already at work on the subgrantee processes outlined in their Volume 2 proposals. “Subgrantee” in BEAD program lingo refers to broadband providers planning to participate in the grant process developed by each state to deploy fiber and other technologies in BEAD-eligible areas. Five states, including Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Ohio, and Texas, have yet to receive final NTIA approval on their initial proposals. Of those five, Texas received the most BEAD funding of any state at $3.3 billion, while Alabama received $1.4 billion, Alaska $1.02 billion, Florida $1.17 billion, and Ohio $790 million.
Even with all that progress as states work through the various stages set up by NTIA, it could be a while before actual deployments start, because states still have to stand up their bidding processes and give providers (subgrantees) time to bid. Then, once the bids have been accepted and selected and after the funding has been distributed, providers should finally be able start the deployment process. At least one analyst, Jade Piros de Carvalho of Bonfire, thinks that while a state like Louisiana could distribute funds in time for providers to start deploying fiber by next spring, many probably won’t start distributing any grant money until sometime in the fall or even into 2026, in part because all states also have to submit a final proposal that has to be posted for comment for 30 days at the end of the entire 10 step process. She also noted that there are hidden milestones not displayed on NTIA’s BEAD dashboard that make it hard to know exactly where each state is in the overall process.
Former FCC official Blair Levin, who works as an analyst for New Street Research and also serves as a senior fellow at The Brookings Institution, recently spoke about how the BEAD program is being run in comparison to the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund. He told Congress last month that the even though it’s taking longer than expected to get BEAD funding distributed, the program is being run much better than RDOF, which he described as “a disaster” under former FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, who left after the 2020 election. Levin blamed the RDOF problems on a combination of the rushed nature of the reverse auction and the use of a national broadband map that sorely lacked in accuracy. He pointed out the effort for the FCC to clean up its data and unveil a new, more accurate nationwide broadband map took a lot of time and that’s why the overall BEAD process seems slower than expected. He also defended BEAD’s affordability requirement, which has come under fire from Congressional Republicans railing about price regulation. Levin further noted that the FCC has always imposed an affordability requirement on public broadband funding in order to keep the cost of service affordable for customers served under those federal programs.
Another boost to the BEAD program came in the form of a study from the Center of Rural Innovation, which found that more fiber in rural areas translates to greater economic benefits. As Telecompetitor reported, rural counties with high broadband availability reported business growth 213% greater than similar counties with fewer broadband options. The data also showed self-employment increases by 10% in areas with greater broadband access because small businesses gain access to more avenues with which to connect to banks and other financial resources. This shows the benefits of the BEAD program’s goal to deploy as much fiber as possible to unserved and underserved areas in order to reach universal broadband service. It’s just taking a bit longer to get there.
