FCC Announces Over $640 Million for Rural Broadband in 26 States

The Federal Communications Commission announced that it is ready to authorize more than $640 million through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund to fund new broadband deployments in 26 states bringing service to nearly 250,000 locations. To date, the program has provided $4.7 billion in funding to nearly 300 carriers for new deployments in 47 states to bring broadband to almost 2.7 million locations. In early 2022, Chairwoman Rosenworcel established the Rural Broadband Accountability Plan (RBAP), a new effort to monitor and ensure compliance for universal service high-cost programs including the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund and Connect America Fund Phase II Auction. The RBAP made a number of changes and enhancements to existing audit and verification procedures, including doubling the number of audits and verifications, conducting the first on-site audits for the programs, and focusing audits and verifications on the largest winning bidders. A fact sheet on the RBAP is available here. The FCC also announced a number of defaulted bids, making the census blocks in those defaulted bids potentially eligible for other funding programs. Lists of the eligible census blocks covered by the winning bids and  defaulted bids are available on the Auction 904 website here.