And Now For a Sample of What is To Come...

So I've written before about the rather clunky (if not anachronistic) set of agencies that will be driving the Broadband Stimulus $$. My claim in the past is that the relative slowness off the blocks of this initiative is attributable at least in part to the unwieldy set of agency interactions that the program calls for. Take, as a mere example, the ambiguity at the core of the Broadband Stimulus: is this an effort to address a rural problem or an "underserved" problem (since they're not one and the same, especially as our definition of what meets a basic level of service evolves).

Now we see that this fundamental problem of definition exists within a single agency. A report released on Monday (4/13/2009) by the Department of Agriculture's inspector general finds that the Rural Utility Service has been making too many loans in non-rural areas (tsk! tsk!):

In 2007, Congress requested that we determine if RUS had taken sufficient corrective actions in response to the issues disclosed in our report. In particular, members of the Appropriations Committee expressed concerns that RUS, “instead of focusing on rural areas that have no broadband service,” continues, “to grant loans to areas where broadband service is already being offered by private providers. Such practices penalize private providers that have already built broadband systems in the area. Such practices also do nothing to further the goal of bringing broadband to unserved areas.”

Take note of the distinction between rural/urban and served/unserved. And ask yourself whether a 200 k.b.s. standard is sufficient to claim that service is being provided. And while you’re at it, ask yourself if having a single location in a given zip code operate at this anemic standard is sufficient to claim that service is being provided. In both cases, the FCC claims it is. Hopefully, in the coming months (or years), we’ll have better data on present and planned deployments and have federal policy pushing a higher standard. But not yet.

Back to the report, since Congress raised this concern, the inspector general’s office issued a report to RUS, outlining several steps the agency should take. Alas,the IG report

found that RUS has not fully implemented corrective action in response to 8 of the 14 recommendations from our September 2005 audit report.

And the real kicker:

We remain concerned with RUS’ current direction of the Broadband program, particularly as they receive greater funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2008 (Recovery Act), including its provisions for transparency and accountability.

In my estimation, the essence of the broadband challenge isn't in some arcane internecine pissing match over how we're applying the definition of urban and rural. The problem is one of standards of service (where service exists) and providing service where it doesn't.