The National Broadband Plan and Tribal Lands

The California Association of Tribal Governments urges the Federal Communications Commission to include a Tribal Broadband Plan into the National Broadband Plan as broadband is the best hope for tribal governments to develop economic development opportunities that support all of the underlying building blocks of economic opportunity that are: education, health care, public safety and governance.

A key goal of the National Broadband Plan must be that all tribal governments, anchor tribal institutions, and tribal citizens, like other Americans, have the opportunity to reap the full benefits of broadband services. Recommendations include:

1) Increasing coordination—among federal agencies; Tribal, state, and local governments; and community groups and individuals—is a critical preliminary step towards ensuring that the federal trustee accomplish its tribal broadband goals and objectives in an efficient and effective way.

2) Congress should direct the NTIA, with FCC Tribal Affairs Bureau support, "to address both short- and long-term needs assessments" for tribal broadband.

3) Tribal recommendations for universal service reform, eligible telecommunications carrier designation process reform, network openness, spectrum access, middle mile/special access reform, inter-carrier compensation, access to poles and rights of way, tower siting, national historical preservation act (NHPA) processes, national environmental policy act (NEPA) processes, and video programming proceedings.

4) To help inform Congress of any needed changes to the recommendations in these challenges to the implementation of the Tribal Broadband Plan, including the completion of the National Broadband Plan, the Federal Communications Commission Chairman should complete a status report on the Tribal Broadband Plan by February 17th every year beginning in 2011.