In many of the most rural areas of the country, E-rate can help bring down school and library costs for internet access, but only to the extent that local infrastructures can support high-speed broadband services. Broadband in unserved or under-served areas remains expensive or unavailable altogether. COVID-era legislation, including the Infrastructure Act, is set to provide billions of dollars designed to close the nation’s digital divide, but only to the extent that those funds are properly targeted to the most deserving states. As might be expected, this is leading to major controversies being played out in broadband mapping data.
At the heart of the controversy is the FCC’s Fixed Broadband Deployment map that many states and other organizations believe relies too heavily on carrier-provided reporting and, as such, dramatically overstates existing coverage. One alternative source of data is the National Broadband Map developed by BroadbandNow. Nationwide the two maps show differences of the following magnitude:
![FCC Broadband Mapping Controversy](https://e-ratecentral.com/Portals/0/Images/news/2022-11-14-2.jpg)
Later this week, the FCC plans to “unveil a pre-production draft of new broadband maps” that may resolve some of the differences in coverage but is unlikely to quell the controversy.
One outgrowth of this controversy is a growing sense of competition between states for the allocation of federal broadband funding. The best prepared states are those that have already begun investing in broadband and that have developed their own mapping programs.