Missouri May Not Be the Only State to Request Defaulted RDOF Funds

Missouri was the first state to ask the Federal Communications Commission to return Rural Digital Opportunity Fund broadband funding awarded to providers in the state who later defaulted on their awards. But it may not be the last. Louis Riggs (R-5), a Missouri state representative who helped spearhead the letter sent by the state’s attorney general to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr asking for the funding, said that officials in other states are having weekly calls to discuss similar letters to be sent by additional states. Missouri could do a lot with its portion of the defaulted RDOF funding and is in a better position than federal administrators to determine how to use it, State Rep Riggs argued on our phone call, reiterating a point he made in an op-ed piece that he penned for the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society. “We know what to do with it; we’ve been doing it now for a number of years,” he said.