WISPA underwrites tool for state broadband offices to calculate high-cost thresholds

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) has been telling everyone for a couple of years that some unserved locations in the US will be too expensive to reach with fiber broadband, and trying to cover these locations with fiber will waste BEAD money. And now, WISPA has underwritten an analysis tool to help state broadband offices set their extremely-high-cost thresholds. WISPA has underwritten the new Broadband Funding Optimization Tool, which was created by the Vernonburg Group. The tool is designed so broadband officers can change settings and assumptions to determine where best to set their extremely-high-cost per location thresholds. To create the high-cost-threshold calculating tool, Vernonburg used data and models from a number of organizations, including the fiber models from Cartesian and Tarana. The Vernonburg tool also takes into account the mix of aerial and buried fiber, which will vary from state to state, because the cost difference between aerial and buried can be quite substantial.