NGC Communications

MCNC Awarded $28.2 Million in Broadband Recovery Funds

The United States Department of Commerce announced today that MCNC, an independent non-profit organization that employs advanced networking technologies and systems to continuously improve learning and collaboration throughout North Carolina’s K-20 education community, has been awarded $28.2 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) Broadband Recovery Funds. North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue and members of the North Carolina Congressional Delegation joined U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke for the announcement.

MCNC operates the North Carolina Research and Education Network (NCREN), one of the nation’s first statewide education and research networks. NCREN provides broadband communications technology services and support to K-12 school districts, higher education campuses, academic research institutions, and public health facilities across the state.

MCNC raised $11.7 million in matching funds for its successful application through private sources, including $4 million from the MCNC endowment, making the total project a $40 million investment in North Carolina’s broadband infrastructure.

“Increased broadband access for underserved areas is a critical infrastructure improvement that will help businesses of all sizes create jobs,” said Gov. Perdue.  “NCREN will also play a vital role as part of my Career and College – Ready, Set, Go! Initiative, which will help ensure those businesses have access to a well-trained workforce.”

This funding will allow North Carolina to leverage the existing NCREN to create more robust access for our schools, libraries and public health facilities, while also reaching our underserved citizens.

The MCNC award is a key part of a coordinated strategy developed by the N. C. Office of Economic Recovery & Investment to improve broadband access for businesses and residents in underserved areas and enhance feasibility of Health Information Exchange (HIE) initiatives across the state, resulting in improved access to health services.

The ARRA appropriated $7.2 billion and directed the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Utilities Service (RUS) and the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA) to expand broadband access to unserved and underserved communities across the U.S., increase jobs, spur investments in technology and infrastructure, and provide long-term economic benefits. The result is the RUS Broadband Initiatives Program (BIP) and the NTIA Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP).

“We are pleased to learn of the BTOP award to MCNC,” said Mike Murphy, chairman of the MCNC Board of Directors.  “The 480 miles of new fiber throughout the western and southeastern part of North Carolina will ensure that our K-12 schools, universities, community colleges, university hospitals, and other community anchor institutions (libraries, public health) will have access to unlimited amounts of bandwidth now and into the future.  All North Carolinians will benefit from the public/private partnership that created this application.”

MCNC will begin immediately to undertake the work of planning and building the new middle-mile fiber. Construction is expected to last up to three years.  The new fiber build will be an essential element in North Carolina’s plans to reach citizens and community anchor institutions that currently have limited broadband access.
Within the next 60 days, MCNC will issue several requests for proposal (RFP) for the design, construction and operation of the network.  These RFPs have the potential to create more than 230 engineering/construction jobs.

The new fiber build will traverse 37 counties in southeastern and western North Carolina.

Consumers and small businesses along the fiber build will be reached with enhanced broadband service through commercial telecommunications and cable providers with whom MCNC has formed partnerships.  FRC/PalmettoNet, a middle-mile operator and partner in MCNC’s application will assist last-mile service providers in reaching consumers and commercial businesses. The network has the potential to serve more than 1,500 anchor institutions, 180,000 businesses, and more than 300,000 underserved families.

“FRC is pleased to be one of MCNC’s key private partners in this project and can think of no better organization than MCNC to lead the expansion of North Carolina’s middle-mile broadband infrastructure” according to John Dudley, FRC’s Senior Director of Public Policy and External Affairs. “We are extremely pleased that the NTIA has recognized the intended benefits of this project and we look forward to building a network which will extend the depth and breadth of broadband within the state of North Carolina.”

This is North Carolina’s second broadband recovery related award.  In October, North Carolina’s broadband authority eNC received a $2.3 million broadband mapping grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce. In addition, the MCNC application has been coordinated closely with other applications for federal economic recovery funds in North Carolina, including those in the areas of health care and education.

Deadline for Broadband Stimulus Funds raises questions, hope

The Innovation Exchange this week takes a look at the first round of Broadband Stimulus funding; who wins, who loses, and who has the time to put together the monster application package needed to secure a piece of the pie.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 appropriated $7.2 billion and directed the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Utilities Service (RUS) and the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA) to expand broadband access to unserved and underserved communities across the U.S., increase jobs, spur investments in technology and infrastructure, and provide long-term economic benefits.

The result is the RUS Broadband Initiatives Program (BIP) and the NTIA Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP). BIP will make loans and grants for broadband infrastructure projects in rural areas. BTOP will provide grants to fund broadband infrastructure, public computer centers, and sustainable broadband adoption projects.

These grants are part of the bigger $787 billion stimulus package that Congress passed earlier this year.

Now that we got the generalities out of the way, let’s talk about it. And, we would love to hear about your experience with this as well.

So, last week, the government extended the application deadline for broadband funds six days to Aug. 20 (today) for the first round of the grants because of the high volume of applications that overloaded the electronic submission system.

This is just one of many complications organizations have or will face while reaching into the stimulus cookie jar. As anyone who has reviewed the application process knows, it is quite lengthy and requires a good deal of resources to complete.  And, given the relatively short period of time between when applications were open and the deadline, it’s no wonder many had difficulty pulling together all of the information needed to apply on time.

Overall, the process is quite difficult, non-creative, and time consuming. After working on applications in recent weeks, some of the guidelines and questions are absolutely ridiculous and about as enjoyable to read as stereo instructions.
I predict others interested in securing broadband funds will wait for the next of the three funding windows in hopes that eligibility requirements will be relaxed. I doubt the rules will change much, if at all, but we will see. Maybe you could volunteer to review (yes, application reviewers right now are volunteers), and learn the ins and outs of what makes a good and not-so-good application.

Along those lines, there are several arguments critics have raised recently that deserve a mention here. Here are a few that caught my eye:

• The eligibility requirements impose a huge burden on small rural communities, and many will not be able to meet them unless they already have a project ready to go (the term shovel-ready is used a lot) and have put together a lot of data and documents.
• The definition of underserved will exclude rural areas that have a small, wealthy holiday home-owning class, but a sizeable number of poor people who live there year-round. I bring this up, because I was a long time resident of the Outer Banks, and I’m curious if that area falls into this realm. I don’t know, but sounds like it could.
• BTOP applicants with matching funds in excess of 20 percent of their project costs get favorable treatment.
• NTIA is not willing to pay people to review grant applications. See, told you reviewers were volunteers.  I do not understand why the NTIA refuses to pay qualified individuals to review proposals. Isn’t this about job creation?
• The NTIA is expected to distribute up to $1.6 billion in the first round of the BTOP program, and the RUS is expected to distribute up to $2.4 billion in the first round of the BIP program.  I believe first rounders will be notified of their status by October or November.

The good news is that if you missed the first round deadline today you still have two more opportunities to apply.  Now, this may seem reassuring, but the Round Two and Round Three deadlines likely will come and go just as fast as the Round One deadlines.

Personally, the Broadband Stimulus is good and has some complicated components to the application process. Once you sift through all the government jargon and stringent guidelines, the nuts and bolts here promote technology infrastructure upgrades that are desperately needed in this country. And, with that in mind, it takes people to make that happen and that creates jobs.

In theory, this should work across the board. We can critique the process until we’re blue in the face, but this is the way it is – for better or worse. Good luck to all our first rounders, and let us know if you get what you think you deserve.