April 11, 2024 AZBSN Digital Access Task Force Recording

7:00PM Apr 11, 2024

Speakers:

Steve Peters

Cindy Hogan

Ilana Lowery

Mark Goldstein

Mala Muralidharan

Henry Goldberg

Megan Hammond

Rory Conaway

Judy Sulltrop

Anthony Constantini

Katrina Parker

Amina Fazlullah

Keywords:

acp

people

program

discharge petition

move

update

plan

questions

year

happening

rory

give

short term

area

pretty

education

ecp

bead

usf

amina

Okay, we are recording and now have the. So get rid of this. So good morning, everybody. Want to thank you all for being here this morning? Have a couple of things to share with you today. And see, do we have anybody who's new this morning?

I don't believe so. So we'll have, we'll get going. So again, always want to thank our sponsors CareFirst healthplan, Karen Ziegler consulting, Valley Telecom, Kajeet and Triad Wireless. And we're going to hear from Rory in just a little while. So that was my active speaker. So the agenda today is going to be a little bit different. First of all, I don't think we're going to have anybody from the Broadband office. There's, they have some kind of event that they're all working on this morning. So they will not be here.

Just Erin told me for yesterday's ATIC board meeting that she and Sandip were at NTIA. So they may be in traveling

now. So anyway, they're also amount of that and then of the Broadband team will not be here this morning. And I don't think Nicole are you online? She is not. So a couple of quick things. The Arizona Broadband office have many of you know, it has been having roundtables. They have several coming up local government is on April, the 16th. Tribal government is on April 17, internet service providers on April 18, and nonprofits on April 17. Also, and again, the link and the information and all that is in the email. And again, I want to remind you that most of the stuff that we talked about is either included in my current email, or the one that will go out in the next couple of days. And so you'll find the links the time and how to join those meetings and so forth. So just want to remind you about that. Related to that is that the Broadband office is actually having open office hours. So if you're any of you are, are interested in being a challenger, that and you have questions and not sure how to go about it, that you can attend one of the open office hours. And so again, that information and how to join and reserve a time slot. All of that is also included in my email. Next thing is the governor governor's inner agency and community Broadband Advisory Council working group. And they have the infrastructure group is meeting on April the 22nd. Digital Inclusion on the 23rd workforce on the 24th and Broadband I have their new Broadband and Digital Equity and tribal communities is on the 25th. Those meetings are open. Again, the links are in the my email. So if you're interested in participating in any of those, you are welcome to do so. Anybody want to share anything about those things before I move on? Okay, if not, we have two sort of presentations this morning. First of all, we're going to be hearing from Rory Conway, CEO of tribe Triad Wireless about an ACP initiative that they're working on, which I think is interesting. And then we'll also hear from Elena Lauer away. And Amina. I know I'm gonna mess up your last name Amina who's Yeah. She is the Senior Director for equity and equity counsel for Common Sense Media. And so we're going to get a report from them about what's happening with the FCC and ACP and I also have some information and maybe they'll cover this or maybe you guys know this and want to share some information I just got from the AC ACLU about what's happening, what's positive actually at On ACP. So with that, I'm just going to jump into it. And, Rory, do you want to take it away? Do you need to share anything? Or do I need to stop sharing my screen?

Yeah, I need to stop sharing for a moment, if you don't mind. Sure. I'll bring it up. So, there we go. So you most you guys probably know me. So nothing special, we announced that we are going to support extending all of our existing ACP customers into, into until some other replacement program comes into place. So we just called trying affordable connectivity. Not super original, usually, I get better acronyms, but we worked hard. And it was a lot of very a lot of balls to work with. So alright, so here. So this is our just let you know, this is kind of our current map of our network. This is obviously mostly Maricopa County, and then you can see two sides of Dallas and so forth. The even though, this is our coverage map, if we get cooperation from the local school district, so that we can get access to their roofs, we can deploy pretty much anywhere, very quickly. Depending on if we have infrastructure close by or towers close by, we can do it literally in days, if, with some cooperation, if we have to bring fiber into an area, it might take, you know, 30 to 45 days, but it is possible for us to deploy anywhere most places in the state pretty quickly. That's as opposed to, you know, to help people that are in this program that are no longer going to have access. The only exception to that is many of the tribal lands require approval by their councils. And so you're limited to whatever their schedule is. So for example, in civic, you, we didn't make the council deadline when we were awarded that project. So that one, we won't get approved, but won't get approval till mid May. So that was so those are some of the small delays we have to deal with. But pretty much everybody involved with with ACP knows the general rules, we're going to have to go at it a little bit differently, because of the fact we don't have access to the data that the federal government, the federal government has. But this is generally, you know, the basic the basic plan as its laid out. They can pick any plan and go from there. I'm not a big fan of putting a lot of writing. So everybody kind of read it for a moment, if you're, but it's there's, there's no gotchas, there's no hidden specials, or anything that they have to work with. The this is most of the tack eligibility rules. Now, we don't include the tribal rules in here simply because we only work on one tribal land at this point. And we're providing them on free internet for the next two years, almost. So it doesn't really apply to that particular tribe. This is mostly for obviously, for everybody else. Now, the obvious question is, how do we guarantee this? Or I'm sorry, how do we review this? Obviously, it's going to be 80% on our system, and 20%, we're going to ask them to just submit something that says that they're in one of these programs, it'll be on our website, they can upload a quick picture of it. And and hopefully, it's accurate, and we'll just go from there. But truly, there's no, there's no legal way for us to verify this data. So we know that the people that are on our network already verified, they have ACP cup of codes. If it's new people, though, you know, hopefully, they're, they're being honest and will and can send us something that says they meet these criteria. That's that's pretty much it. There's not much anything special outside of the ACP program. Other than, like I say, if we have areas, clusters of people that need help, you know, we have the ability to get in there. We're expanding out now into we're working on a couple more school districts right now. But if you have some school districts that are in need, just please let us know. And then

this is the general concept. The part of the reason for the two year contract is that it gives us an ability to have more accurate data on the customer. And so that's what you know, that's typically what we we require those people, we are like I say, we are going to have a special 50 meg package, which is $30 for everybody. And then for those who You don't know Tryon has been offering what we call an education everywhere program for $10. For students, it is simple filters simple as the criteria that schools use for filtering content for children in the schools, so we've always had that program. In fact, they were probably going on 10 or 11 years now. And then

that's, that doesn't change, we're going to continue to offer that as long as we eat as long as possible. So that's pretty much it, nothing, nothing real super special here. If anybody has any questions, or they have any contacts, they need us to talk to schools or anything that might need coverage, just please let us know. We are going to be sending a letter out to superintendents of miracle County and and just around the miracle County area, just let them know we have this program available if they have students that have that have this issue. So that's pretty much it. Anybody have any questions? Okay, then,

yep. Marie, I have a question. Oh, yes, ma'am. Um, so are you are you saying that you could provide service anywhere in Maricopa County?

Pretty much? Well, we're still working on like Litchfield Park. But we've, we're working with agraphia to expand into that area. And we haven't really covered much past metro center area up by 17. It just, you know, there's so much expansion going on is pick a zone. But we could you know, if there was a school district up in that area, your Area School District. I don't know, whatever the Glendale areas covered, I probably can't can't remember, you know, if they say hey, we we need internet in this area, and they will give you access to top of our auditorium. Yeah, we can be out there and you know, in a week.

Thanks. Headed question. Sorry. Oh, I just had a question. Um, could you what's, I'm not familiar with their education everywhere program. Like, how does this differ from that?

Okay, so just as a, our, our donation to children. One thing we one thing I don't like personally, and since my company, I don't like children not having access to internet that just, you know, that bothers me personally. So we created a program called education everywhere, that we will provide a $10 Internet package to underprivileged children, students that at their house, under you know, it's for them to make sure they had connectivity, with the criteria that it is a simple filter system, and we get to limit what they what they have access to, that's not within the scope of, you know, of education, you know, because we don't want them on their playing games. It's not designed for $10 a month, it's not designed to handle a heavy load of games and watching Netflix all night long. Now, if it's education related, our system falls under, let's say falls under the CIPA rules. Plus, we have the ability to do additional filtering beyond that. But it's specifically there to make sure kids can get to their school material or whatever they need to be, you know, to have connectivity, that's

helpful, um, do do sort of like, kick the tires on this program with educators to get a sense of like, what the like, usage, you know, what are the current programs or applications that they expect kids to be able to use so that it sort of matches up? We can

run any into any issues with with the CIPA compliance filtering at this point.

Oh, it's filtering. I guess what I was asking. It's just about the, you know, like, what type of usage? I'm, I'm just curious for my own work, like, what kind of what kind of usage and what kind of levels of service or if meet educational needs, like as of now, I realize it's a changing mark, but says curious if you had those conversations with school partners? No, there

really wasn't much other than each individual families that have contacted us. The schools really haven't jumped on this, which, you know, they're there. When COVID hid, we thought this would go desert, you know, we added a few people, but the schools were more willing to buy the hotspots for $75 a month to do the same thing that that education everyone has been doing for years, for $10 a month. I don't have we're not a mark. I mean, we're an engineering firm first. So we don't have somebody that goes and talks to all the schools all the time. I mean, honestly, this is the most public you've ever been as, you know, as this group, so, you know, as an engineering firm, we can pretty much you know, we have the ability to do a lot of things, whether people take advantage of it, that's, we mentioned it we I write, I used to write articles on it, but honestly, there wasn't that much. A few qualify a statement. So saddle mountain, very, very cooperative. And we've worked with them. Rainbow Valley, their liberty School District, they've been very good. Arlington has been used has been great, you know, those, the local school districts in the West Valley, all jumped on the program and gave us access to real ifs, and we have tons of kids on the on different programs. So other than that, we really haven't done much with it. We let everybody know it's there. But we don't really, you know, publish it a whole lot.

Got it. Okay. And is there a limitation? Like if you've got a student using education everywhere with the parents not have access to this?

We've had the we've had to shut down a few of the connections that the parents or the rest of the family try to use with educate with

this problem? No, no, no, I'm saying like, can they? So could a kid have the education everywhere program, which is like CIPA filtered, but would a parent who was on ACP be able to use your ACP extension?

Well, if you have ACP, you don't need the education everywhere. That wouldn't be filtered. Could we run split packages inside the house? Yeah, we actually did that for a test for a couple of places. But honestly, it wasn't worth it. It was easier. If they have you know, if they have regular internet, the education everywhere doesn't make any sense. Okay, oops, sorry, guys.

Sorry, Rory. So if a student is on the education everywhere, and they graduate out of school, could they still use? Could they move or switch to ACP then?

Yeah, just a phone call us? We'll

switch it over. Okay. And

what are the speeds that your ACP plan? reaches?

Sorry? Um, well, you could run ACP. On any plan. I apologize. Apparently, there's an automated update going on in the background. You can run that any plan? It doesn't matter. But

you have a baseline $30 plan at 50 megabit per second, that would be free to an ACP user. Yes. Very good.

So that's actually free for an ACP user. That, that $30 A month after you give them a subsidy?

No, it's It's $30 a month, including on this plan, and a $60 month plan.

Okay. Oh, excuse me. So

okay. After the subsidy, and what is the upload speed on that? 50 megabits?

I believe it's 10 Meg. Okay, if you buy 10, we're throwing out the idea right now of reducing that to $20. So give us a couple of days where it's it's in debate internally right now.

So that wouldn't, that particular plan would not be eligible under a BEAD infrastructure.

It's not designed for beat entry. It's built as an ad hoc, get it out to people as fast as we need to. Because ACP is closing, we have to make plans. And then and those are a little bit more and they can take, then that's what's falling under be funny to say,

Henry B BEAD, your network has to be built to be 100 Slash 20 capable, but you're encouraged to have affordability across your portfolio of plans. And so you couldn't under BEAD only offer a 50 megabit plan, but in the context of offering a variety of plans, that's still a BEAD, you know, fundable capable of level, as long as you also have higher speed plans in the mix,

I guess but I thought the way I understood it was that that they had to offer 120 plan at a low price point for, you know, people

Yeah, but every state beads proposal, there's actually a good bit of pushback from a number of states. It varies by state. I'd have to as someone maybe Cindy or someone from the Broadband office here can comment on the affordability and even in states where they ask for a $30 plan. They are in almost all cases willing To take exception by request and maybe some proof that that is not affordable proof of service level for $30. It does vary by state.

Thanks. Thanks, Mark. I mean, that's good explanation. But obviously, Henry, this program is what we did has nothing to do with BEAD, the one, we can deliver one gig out in those areas, those are be compatible. We only did this because we had set we had, I don't think we had 74 people on ACP that were about to lose their ACP, but we needed a way to make sure that they didn't lose it.

Right. Nothing has nothing to do with BEAD. Yeah,

I mean, you know, we're private, we're private enterprise, we can do whatever the heck we want. And we can do it, but we can do it very quickly.

Okay. And does that use a particular spectrum? That you're, you're offering all your packages under like, is it's licensed spectrum? Or

maybe we use a lot of spectrum? It depends on the area, and depends how hard it is to get to that location. Okay.

Henry, but the interesting spectrum ripple recently has been the approval of CBRS general access GA as code 72, a new code which is licensed by what is it not by design licensed by what is it Rory?

I don't know, Mark, your legal guy in this

view mark. They used to come they originally considered CBRs under a general license rather than a pal spectrum license as unlicensed and that did change. So a lot of wisps use CBR s under a GA license. And that now is a new code considered equivalent to license spectrum.

Okay, okay, so now, just wondering whether this particular ACP plan of worries is a CBRs plan or something else depends

where it is,

the location, I mean, we've got CBRs over most of our network, but, you know, those radios are, are, are not inexpensive. So, you know, we're gonna put somebody out in education and we're gonna they're gonna probably not have most expensive equipment. But, but that being said, we're also not going to turn them down. So whatever it takes to get to that location, and we'll take care

of it licensed by rule is a new term for code 72, terrestrial fixed wireless that the CBR s now falls under Henry

they are taking license they are taking rule 71 Mark, because we let you go you are involved. So, we would it would have cost us a huge amount of time to redo all our to do everything again. But we will have to we'll refile it under 72. Next time, your words on paper? Oh, word, your word. Till next year.

I just put a FCC link in the chat that codifies the new coding. I mean, you kind of see why I worry, right. I mean,

are there any installation costs that

people have to pay? No,

no. How about in multi dwelling units.

Multi dwelling is hard is we have to have permission to to get on the roof. And not a lot of miles. We haven't really pushed that. Mala we could. But it's only recently that it's been easier to get to those multi dwelling units. They've been able to lock us out under under some formal federal rules up to a point now it's wide open, but we haven't done any marketing to those locations. We don't really care as long as they give us access to roof when we can run a cable down a building then we're okay.

Good at an apartment. Well, we're putting an antenna on their patio inside of one of your transmitters.

We don't have the density of towers that Verizon has. So right you know, you got a 40% chance it might work or less. Probably not in most cases, I'd say probably not.

Marilyn, you had a question. And I think that the Trina answered it in the chat that we answered your questions.

Yeah, you answered my questions. Thank you so much. It's

okay. This available

only in Maricopa County or are you expanding beyond like Pinal? And?

Oh, no, we've we've got it. I think it's a bigger map. But now we've got coverage in different spots around the state. So any anywhere we have coverage, we're well, we can do it quickly. If we don't have coverage, you know, we asked that the school districts that are local, if they'll give us access to the roof, we're not going to set a tower up and have three people on it, it just doesn't make sense. And with the amount of BEAD funding that's going into the fibre around the state, most rural areas are getting probably getting fiber. So you know, it's not it doesn't seem cost effective for us to put infrastructure out into an area for a handful of people unless we have some kind of low cost, vertical asset. If we have to go into areas we're not in yet.

So willing to do Sorry, go ahead. So Rory, I just want to interrupt you for a little bit. So Amina, who is going to be talking a little more about what's happening with ACP is going to have to leave. So what I'd like to do is and this conversation for a while, let her do that. And then we will come back. And any more questions that you might have? Yeah,

I actually also have to leave for a meeting here shortly. So. But anyway, my email address is out there, if anybody has any questions, or Katrina will stay on the line if you guys have additional questions.

Questions. Okay. So just one last thing, Rory, that when you and I chatted, and you said in the email that you sent me that you really think that other ISPs ought to be doing similar kinds of things, that, you know, from your perspective, the more we they have a responsibility to do that. And so I don't know how we do that. But anyway, I just wanted to put that out there.

Well, AT and T is doing it. Katrina told me that Comcast is now doing something when we created education everywhere. And the originally, a couple years later, we started to see a similar program pop up after we wrote the article and made it public. You know, other other ISP started doing that. So or had some type of similar program. So anyway, alright. Well, thank you. Thank you for the time. Yeah.

Thanks, Rory. So let's, let's move on, and introduce Amina, and she was you're still here, aren't you? I mean, to kind of give us an update on what's happening with ACP? There you are. I do need to share anything. I mean, do you need to share your screen or anything? No,

no, I'll be quick. So I think the the big news around ACP is that we're still fighting for short term funding. There's also a simultaneous effort that's happening to investigate different ways for long term funding for an ACP like program or the ECP itself. So I think I'll just start by just like flagging one sort of urgent item for anyone in the group and to share widely, which is the ACP short term effort is largely tied to something called the ECP Extension Act of 2024. So this is asking for one year of additional funding, that is now set to be potentially released by what's called a discharge petition. So there's that means that there's enough members of Congress in the house that have co signed co sponsored the bill that the bills authors believe that they will be able to move the bill through committee into the floor without waiting on sort of normal order normal process. It's a rare move. It doesn't require leadership, it doesn't require, like I said that like typical sort of committee structure. So in this would be a discharge petition to discharge it out of the Appropriations Committee, and then they would have like a second petition to move it to the floor. And so what's good about that is that it shows the strength of the item. So there are enough co-sponsors that the bill seems like it. If given a floor vote like on paper it should pass which would be great. We've always heard that the house is the tougher sell than the Senate. So that's all very good news. So there's an opportunity big close of business today, we've been asked by the bills authors to sign to join a sign on letter, encouraging the discharge petition to move forward. So I think galena is gonna send that around. If you haven't already seen it circulating, I think we've been trying to push it out through every every possible channel, feel free to pass this far and wide, it's a really good, like all hands on that kind of moment, it's a really good way to continue pushing for short term ACP funding. I think it shows leadership in the House, this is a bill that has a lot of widespread, widespread support, it's possible that this discharge petition operation would actually come to a conclusion and they get a vote and move on. It's also very likely that it like just the Vert by virtue of of having enough votes, to even have the like, possibility of a discharge petition will get House leadership to sort of pay attention closely to the ACP Extension Act, and potentially just add it to any other moving vehicle that's available. There may be an emergency supplemental related to the bridge collapse in Maryland. And so and then there are conversations around a few other mechanisms that could potentially help pay for the ACP Extension Act. So all of this is just to demonstrate, I think, at least Step one is to demonstrate there's a lot of support, and that it's not just support on paper, but support to like, actually move the bill out of committee quite quickly. So that's really exciting news. There's like been some like press accounts that have come out yesterday and today about it. So if you see that that's what it means. The discharge petition isn't like a guaranteed slam dunk. But it is like I think, a very, very strong step forward to show how much support there is for this bill. The next thing that I wanted to kind of flag for folks is that there is

before you move on, what's happening with the Senate and with regard to this, and

so I think so this, these are separate tracks. So the discharge petition is only for the house. It's it's gotten to a level in which it can sort of move quickly through this discharge petition process. It would be a different, like, completely different thing in the Senate and in the Senate. I think as of now, Van Hollen who's on appropriations, as well as the bill sponsors, Welch, and I can't remember his name, Ohio's Vance, are, are like, strongly supportive of what's happening in the house and sort of paying attention. Van Hollen has like expressed the need to include ECP as part of any kind of emergency appropriation. And I would suspect that Van Hollen, who is the senator from Maryland will have pretty good and on appropriations will have good insight into any kind of emergency or preparation that's being put together and whether or not ACP couldn't fit into it. So this is just again, having this move in the house will also be supportive in the Senate. But I don't think that there is a parallel move. It's a different process. Like I think the closest thing would be something called unanimous consent. And you would need to have like, a lot of co sponsors to like be able to move for like unanimous consent on the Senate side.

Sorry, so go ahead. And here. We're going to talk about something else. Yeah.

So the other sort of flag is that there's recently been some white paper white, sorry, an early draft of the Neutrality rules that have come out. And common sense as well as a number of other organizations have filed comments on the record, supportive of reclassification, but concerned about forbearance of section 234. I just want to give people a heads up, I think the language is still forbearing from that section. So that essentially means that Broadband providers would not be required to pay into To the USF program, that's our we've argued that like, it's, if you don't forebear the head, you leave the option on the table, but you don't actually require anybody to pay. And so we've been working with a number of other organizations sort of meet with the commission staff on that when they seem to understand and agree with that, I think it's just a matter of you know, whether or not the commission is going to really diverge from what was done in the past when they reclassified and do something slightly differently, because last time they did forbear from this section. The reason it matters so much is because many of us think that USF could be a good place for ACP to exist in the long run. And to do that there needs to be changes to how or to there has to be contribution reform to the program. It's a program right now has dwindling amounts coming in, but like exploding amounts going out. And so and this has been a problem for like years that everybody who probably talks about USF is pretty familiar with contribution reform is a very difficult nut to crack. So we just are urging the FCC like not to tie their hands by making this decision at this point and leaving it on the table. And, you know, maybe starting a proceeding, like later to kind of really investigate the impact of bringing in bias providers to the program, and how they might do it, and what that could look like before they make any decisions one way or another. And also on contribution reform, there's an effort, a bicameral bipartisan effort in the Senate in the house to look into USF contribution reform. And they've, they are proposing various entities to pay into the program, potentially internet advertising, as recommended by Chairwoman Rosenworcel, potentially, some bias customers, but not all, again, as suggested by chair Rosenworcel. So there's their discussions happening in Congress as well, however, like waiting on Congress to, to address contribution reform is tricky, because they can move very, very slowly. And so it's important, again, in our opinion, that the FCC have all the tools available to them ready and available just in case that effort stalls out, especially in light of an election year coming out. Because even if Congress were to make some decisions and contribution reform, probably take like 18 months to two years, to like fully baked that process, make the contribution form changes, include ACP into the program, start actually getting those new fees, and then like, have ACP restart. So you know, we think it's really important that we have sort of all tools on the table. So anyhow, that's just an update on what's happening at the FCC. And what's happening in Congress on yourself contribution reform. And, and then, like I said, I think the priority issue really is supporting the discharge petition in the house. And hopefully, that like helps us have the extension act in a good spot to be able to, like hop on to any kind of moving vehicle.

Any questions? Yeah, that was what?

I guess the good thing is that there's at least some glimmer of hope that maybe something will actually happen. But who knows, these days?

I think I think that's why these efforts to have some kind of short term support for ACP customers are really good. It's really important. Because I think that if it sort of seemed like it's dead and gone and ended and like, it kind of gives members sort of have an excuse to say like, well, it's over. Like, we're not going to work on it anymore. So I think demonstrating that this is a live issue. And we're actively working to kind of keep these customers serves sort of continues to put pressure and then of course, you know, welcome everybody to sign on to the letter. Mala. I think you had a question.

No, the question and question was, what's going to happen in transition because even with the discharge, petition going through, that's going To be some gap between the end of this program and the start of lettering. So, during that time, are we in a position to kind of send a flyer out or inform people who are in this program? Not to despair and maybe a couple of months? And, you know, are we able to make that promise?

I don't know that it can be a promise it guess that's What's difficult is that like, I think until till we have more certainty. I think like, that's hard. It's hard for us to make that guarantee. And I certainly wouldn't make that guarantee to somebody who was relying on the ECP to say, like, it's only going to be three months, and then I'll restart, because I don't have that information yet. But I think that like what I will say is it's not done. Right, like so like, we're still fighting for short term funding. And so there is a possibility that the program will restart, I think that is a fair statement to make, as opposed to giving them like a shot clock of how long they'll be in this sort of Nether World. Right.

And it may maybe, I don't know, common sense has been doing such a great job with ACP. So I don't know, common sense to draft something that they could send to all of us who, you know, receive certain queries and who have been actively promoting ACP,

I'd be happy to we could maybe Lena and I could put together some, like talking points to share around because everyone's gonna have different ways of communicating with their emphasis. But I can, I'm happy to share on talking points so that you're not overstating. Right.

And to be politically correct, you know, what we say?

Yeah, yeah, no, I think like I said, it's like, bipartisan support, it's moving forward. But like, a lot of this is well above my paygrade, for sure. Like I've not, you know, who knows, congressional funding for a billion dollars is like, I don't yet have like a good crystal ball on that. So for an election year, so it's it's tough one to be able to, like give a lot of certainty to but like I said, like, I think there is, there's a few avenues. There's like a potential emergency appropriation. There's potential pay fors that are starting to come up. I think we'll have more clarity, honestly, by like the end of May, whether or not because I don't think that there's going to be a lot of congressional action that goes deeper into the summer. So like, have a sense of like, are we focused on long term changes like USF? Or are we still, you know, or is there still an opportunity for some short term funding and long term changes? And I think we'll have more clarity on that by the end of May.

Right, and me, and what I'm actually looking for, is something that In layman terms, you know, that this is short term, this is what we're looking at long term and doesn't have to have much more than just, you know, not that so that they're not desperate, you know, or they don't give up their internet. Even if they're paying for it themselves. They would pay for it short term. And you could send that to Steve so he can distribute it to all of us, you know, because I'm sure there's more than me that wants

it. Yeah, no, that's something we can do.

Steve, I did send the letter to you the sign on letter. So and I sent it Cindy, if Cindy still on the call. I sent it to Cindy as well for Aiden and Tim Mignon for the coalition.

I also got got it from ACLU with kind of an update also. And I'll send that to you. I mean, you haven't seen it.

Done. I've done it, Elena. Thank you.

Yeah, I would just send it far and wide. It's very short term turnarounds. But yeah, I think they

were looking for a response by tomorrow, if I'm not mistaken.

That's right. Tomorrow close of business. Yeah.

So we'll get that out. Right away. Awesome. Well, thank you for being a great, great overview. It's positive, of course, who knows whether the house will have a speaker by the end of the day.

There's a lot of moving parts. You're right.

I mean, this is a Judy Sulltrop with Senator Kelly's office, and that was a great overview. And I wish I had one ledge team members on because that was a really good overview. Unfortunately, my office wasn't as they they just aren't sure to put the information out because it's been so tricky. And they're not sure they're very hopeful, but they don't, you know, these paths forward especially to have to get through the house and The Senate. And just like Mala had said, I don't they, they aren't sure how this, this is going to lay out. I mean, surely, you know, something needs to be in place right now, in order for us not to have that gap. So it's so great that triads able to maybe step in here for a little bit, or hopefully some other ISP providers.

I think that's right, I think we're at a point where, you know, we do need providers to step in and prepare, because even if something passes, it will take some time for all of that to, to work itself out. I'm sure the chairwoman if if something were to pass would be very enthusiastic. But I'll add one last thing, we did have a call from the FCC that came in on Monday, they were really enthusiastic about pushing for short term funding, I don't think they have given up yet at all. And in fact, I think during sort of the last week of April, they've really encouraged everyone to be as vocal as possible. So to the extent that there are organizations that are interested in doing more than just this letter, press releases social media op eds, letters to the editor, you know, sending notes to your members. I think all of those things like are important things to do. You know, even if your members are on the bill, I think it's still worthwhile, because it just demonstrates, you know, this is still a live issue. But I do think that everybody is working to continue for that short term funding push so but we are we are no longer sort of in that mode of only short term funding. I think we do need to sort of prepare for like a wind down of the program, customers having another option, and then potentially coming back.

So Mina, I know, it's always hard to tell what's happening in Congress these days. But is there a quote bloc of Congress, people who are opposed that we know of, or they just aren't paying attention at the moment?

So yeah, that's a good question. ACP has not had sort of, like strong opposition, you would expect, I think there is opposition from key members, which is disappointing. So I think Ted Cruz has voiced a lot of opposition to ACP. But I think that's like, in line with just generally his opposition to programs like ACP rather than just ACP. It doesn't seem like they're very specific arguments. Senator Thune has is simultaneously very supportive about including ACP into USF, but it has been sort of publicly negative on the program. So almost sort of dismissive of the need for short term funding, that's very disappointing, because, you know, like, on one hand, it's very welcoming of keeping the program going in a long lasting way, but like, doesn't seem to recognize the need to have like the program to continue to that long lasting, you know, opportunity for the program. So, you know, those would be the two that have been sort of most vocal. Cathy McMorris Rodgers has has not been really vocally negative about ACP, but like, again, hasn't been supportive, and disappointing thing is that these are all sort of key Republicans and various committee posts. And so having having that negativity, it's not good, but I don't think that there's, you know, like, an opposition that's coming in and lobbying. So like, that's a rare occurrence. Like there's an other side showing up to Congress. You know, like everyone who's showing up to talk about ACP, whether it's industry or advocate are in lockstep about the need for this program to continue in for the short term funding.

So is Cruz opposed to ACP? I think what I saw was that he was opposed to having changes to the or he had some issues regarding changes to the US app, or is he specifically concerned about ACP?

I mean, Cruz has never liked lifeline war. Now, ACP or EB. So like, these are most of the programs that have provided support to either low income communities or anchor institutions have not been his favorites. So I don't know that it's a position to sort of negotiate with I think it's a position that has more to do with messaging. So, you know, we, we've reached out to the office, lots of folks have talked to them, you know, I think that there's some frustration even within his own caucus So I'm in trying to work with them, because I think there's strong bipartisan support for ACP. So wicker and Thune have like bent over backwards to end, Vance have bent over backwards to work with Cruz on this. And like, they haven't really been, I think, offering up any real suggestions of what to incorporate into language that would bring them on board, other than to say, like, we don't want short term funding, because we want to make changes. But then when you turn around and start talking about changes, they sort of say, like, we don't really want a program like this within us. So like, you know, it's kind of like a moving target, unfortunately.

So, Judy, if you want, I can get this recording to you to share with your people. ASAP, if you're interested. Sure.

Yeah, I was trying to communicate with them through our signal chat to see if they could give me an update right now. But I, I don't have any answers. But I, I do have to hop off the phone. But what I will do is, I will make sure that if, if they give me a substantive update, that I will send it out. So yeah, they they have actually held back a little, because they didn't want to put they there's been such dysfunction. And it's been so difficult to get things moved through. So I think that so they were kind of holding back. But that being said, you know that it sounds really great. I hope that there is some movement in house because that I think is is critical.

Yeah, like I said, the two things I would do right now is one sign the letter. So we can sort of continue that pressure on House leadership. And to you know, that last week of April, be as public as you can about your support for ACP or the need for an ACP like program, the need for, you know, just just talking about what's actually happening with ACP customers. I think like that continuing drumbeat will be really useful that last week of April, because decisions will be made that first week of May.

So, Judy, yeah, I know, again, there's I know, there's so much happening in Congress right now. Do you have any sense of whether the Senator has reached out and I think that's what you were saying that you would check into whether the Senator has reached out to the other senators regarding position?

Oh, yeah. He and he's actively involved to our staff, you know, he originally signed on he has been working, there are three avenues. They, they they actually cautioned me not to, to exactly say, because part of it is that there's there's some different avenues that they're trying, and they haven't made it public yet. So, you know, one is obviously the FCC route. And the other is that he, he even co authored a bill, but it was still in committee, and I'm sure everybody here that is aware of legislate with some things in committee that we don't know how fast it can move. Right. So and so that's kind of where it is. For him. He's always been a supporter and is strongly supportive, and, you know, has been vocal about it. However, you know, especially with the appropriations going through without the funding, you know, all of this is been difficult, you know, what he he wrote a, it was back, I think, in January, where you know, that the service providers, the streaming services, that there would be a small stipend, that would happen to keep it going. So at that, I just can't, you know, I can't speak to some of the other issues because they, they basically said, Look, we're not ready to take give I guess, give the update on every avenue that they're working on, because they are pretty broad, and we really, the thing is, we can't do much without the house. You know, approving it and like Amina had said it's a tougher it's a tough For house than the Senate, I think that you probably have support in the Senate. Although, you know, again, it depends on what it looks like so and where it's added. And that's all we can say right now.

So thank you, Judy. So any questions? So Mina has gotta leave any quick questions for her duty. Before we move on. Great overview, Amina. Thank you very much. And Judy, thank you.

What was Amenas? Job Title again, I

in your policy director.

Okay, senior policy are common.

Okay, good. Thank you all. Thank you, Amina and Elena for arranging to have her be here today. Okay, so moving on. Any questions? So So are there any questions? Right? Yes, we're always gone. But who's the other? Who's from? Oh, Katrina. Katrina is here. Anybody have any other questions about the program that Rory talked about? So one thing that would be helpful is anybody who knows about other ISPs that are doing similar kinds of programs, it would be helpful to kind of get an A list of who we know at this point is doing some kind of similar, Steve,

we do know that AT and T announced they will be doing something similar to Rory, they will be continuing to honor the subsidy levels of or ACP out of their profits. I imagine their operating expenses.

Okay. Well, if there are any others, I don't want to take any more time because I want to get to a couple other things today. The others? I'm sorry. Go ahead, Katrina.

Hi, Steve. Just real quick, because I've been researching other ISPs that do have programs that are similar for ACP. I know that Cox have one that's called Connect assist. Wired has fiber assist program, these programs are usually somewhere around a 30 $35 range with around 100 megabit by 100 by 20. Speed. So there are other ones they is just not as easily found as so but they it you have to do a little Navigating on their website to find them.

Who was that second one? Katrina.

It's called Wired. If w YYE. rd. Oh, okay. Yeah, they're from what I've seen. They are in the Buckeye and surprise area.

Steve, if Meg I think Megan Hammonds on the phone. Megan, do you know if we're going to update Kinect, Arizona's page that has the low cost plans? Are we in the Are we in a place where that can be updated? To include these sort of temporary fixes?

I know that they are working on updating that list currently researching who's still offering plans, we can get an update on when the updates will be ready.

Okay, because we can share that out. That would be you know, that link to that particular page. That includes triad and I think Cox is already on there and all of that. I think that would be helpful for everybody on the call to have that link.

Yep, absolutely.

So that's a great transition to getting some other updates in the State Library is up next. So Megan, do you have anything else? And then we'll get to Anthony and Mauer in just couple of minutes.

I don't have anything else. So I'll hand it off to Anthony. Okay.

So, Mala, do you have anything else that you want to report on today?

I'm not particularly you know, everything I wanted to say. I mean, there's said so beautifully and so much more eloquently. I just wanted to know, I could not attend the planning meeting yesterday. Net inclusion. So if Anthony or you one of you could give us updates. Whoever attended that'd be great.

Actually, thank you for reminding me. I meant to do that. So I know Atlanta was there and Anthony was there. I don't know who else was there. That's on the call too. They, why don't we just do that real quickly? And well, if any, do you have anything regarding the library? Before we get get to that?

No, I don't have any major updates for the library.

Okay. So, Anthony, and or Elena, you want to just do a quick recap at the meeting yesterday?

Sure, go ahead, Anthony. Oh, yeah.

Um, so I think that we were just kind of discussing different, different ideas for the conference, we were talking a little bit about some of the things that we could do like site tours, taking people around to different areas in that area and healing River. Kind of the logistical side of things. We're also discussing different groups, I think that they'll be sorting people into so there'll be an overall planning committee, as well as some subcommittees, I guess. There's going to be a committee for sponsorships, and a couple other committees, I believe. And I think there'll be sending out an email about that.

So just a reminder that that meeting, and you all should have gotten notices about that meeting yesterday. But NDIA is planning to have their net inclusion, their big, great conference, here in Arizona next year. And so this was kind of a gathering to get some input regarding that conference, and so forth. So thank you, Anthony. Weiner, do you want to add anything more to that?

Yeah, I have a few notes I took. So there's going to be a look, the local planning committee is sort of like a volunteer group of anybody who wants to participate, and there'll be sending out some notifications as to when those meetings will happen. Probably they said monthly for right now. And then obviously, when we get closer to next May, they'll meet more regularly. But there's a sponsorship committee subcommittee, a site tour subcommittee and a cultural subcommittee. And these will be the groups that really plan the different activities and events. So there, you know, obviously, they want to focus on the tribal aspect. I mean, that part of the reason it's it's on the Hilo River Reservation, and at I always want to say Wildhorse pass, but it's the other hotel. It's the it's the Sheraton. It's by the golf course. So which is a beautiful hotel, very, very cultural, you know, in in decor and nature and all of that. But, so that's really kind of the theme is sort of the, you know, is Arizona, right? So net inclusion is the overall theme, bringing people together to advance Digital Inclusion, etc, etc. So yeah, so other than that, if people have ideas for sponsorships for various things, companies who want to host you know, receptions, that's always a big a big thing you're looking at between, I think last year it was 1200. This year, they're expecting more than that. It has grown by about two to 400 people every year. Mala I don't know the future planning meetings will be probably not necessarily in person. The committee meetings might be in person but probably the because I think Angela si for will be involved and her team will be involved. I think that they will probably be remote, actually. So we'll know more about that later. And then you

want to just tell people who Angela seeker is. I can assume everybody knows that. Oh, yeah.

I don't know her exact title, but she's the head of of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance. Cindy, I don't know. Do you know her title? Executive Director? I don't know.

Yeah, I don't I don't know.

But yeah, so there's some really great ideas. One of the one of the things they want to try to do is normally at net inclusion, it's in a big city last year was in Philadelphia and like they take in sort of the the city as as you know, where places to go and things to do and all of that but because it's going to be Hilo River and everything is largely, you know, going to be at the property. There's not a lot of ways to get to anything because it's it's 20 minutes from the airport, but there's really no No place to walk to get a, a sandwich, for example. So they're really going to lean into the idea of burnout, like all of us who have been doing this work for the last three years, and being able to, you know, have some time to relax, take in some of the culture, as I mentioned, you know, do some things that involve being staying on the property, and having activities that involve being with each other. So that we can share I mean, people come from all over the country, there's even people that come from from other countries, and so there's going to be some opportunities to take in, you know, to to take advantage of, you know, the beautiful surroundings that we're going to be in, we're, if anybody's gone in the past, it's been very much, you know, you're in this big city, and we're going to focus on activities within the city. And this is going to be kind of different. They are going to do site tours on the last day of the conference on this the half of the second day or half of the third day. And so we're you know, the the committee who's handling that will figure out where it is they should go so that people can see all of the good things that are happening in and around Arizona, obviously, it's, you know, it'd be kind of hard to get 40 people on a bus to go to, you know, to go to Tucson, where there's amazing things happening, but there may not be time to do that. So they have to figure out, you know, locally, what are some things that they can do with people who want to see what's happening here in Arizona, you know, probably within Maricopa County. So we'll see, there's lots of stuff. I'm

sorry, go ahead. No, no, I

was gonna say lots of really good ideas. So I won't go into all of that, but you know, really fun stuff. So

we'll obviously keep you updated. As the planning planning takes place. And there'll be plenty of opportunity for you to provide you the information on how you can provide input to the planning committee and, and or directly can dia. Okay, so Sandy, you want to give us an update on Aiden?

I'd love to I'm I'm Cindy Hogan. Finally, she's here. I'm the executive director of the Arizona Digital Inclusion network. We call it Aiden for short. We're an organization, the coalition of organizations and individuals from across the state networking to advanced Digital Equity. In Arizona. We meet every other Thursday. Our next meeting is today, from 12 to one. Today's meeting, we're gonna have member spotlights, we're going to ask members to take time to tell us about their organization's their work, current projects and what kind of support they're needing at this time. And we're also going to have started a kickoff conversation about Digital Inclusion week. That's a national event that happens every year, first full week of October, so it'll be October 7 to 11th. And 2024. One thing that I if you're in Tucson this weekend, we're having something called Tech fest, which is being being sponsored by weak hair, Tucson, their local recycler computer refurbisher organization. And they're bringing together events and activities for all ages, we've got a gaming truck coming, we're going to have lots of people on hand to help people and older adults or adults who don't, aren't real tech savvy, have questions, we're going to have people that can answer questions about their devices. There are going to be people doing digital art and also did recycled art using computer parts. So if you're in Tucson, it's on it's 10 to three and it's on stone Avenue. I can I can post I can have. Well, Steve, I think you have the flyers maybe.

Yeah. And I've included it in in our newsletter. Excellent. Yeah.

We're really looking forward to that. And we're going to have a lot of resource tables that we're going to have connect Arizona resources on hand. Workforce development people, cybersecurity people. So we're hoping it's going to be a big success. And if it is, we'll we'll continue to do them twice a year or once a year or do another one and in during Digital Inclusion week.

Okay, anything else? Nope. You've had your hand up. I apologize. Did you have a question or a comment? Are you there? Hello. Okay,

I don't see that any on the screen any longer.

Okay, well I do but that's alright. Anyway. So any other comments or questions, announcements that people have?

Steve Oh, just highlight two things I put early on in the chat. GG sollen and the American Association of Republic broadcasting, have not only published the own your own internet, how to build a public network, book, very good book that you've now shown in the ACBS notes, there are a series of related webinars, one a month for the next three months, the first of them on the 16th of April. And then secondly, there's a brand new published guide from NTIA called the state Digital Equity implementation manual, a guide and recommendations to states themselves as they implement Digital Equity plans. So they're in the chat, you may want to roll that information into your newsletter as you do Cherwell.

So one last one last thing is that I have a weighing I've been in touch with Drew about doing some kind of a program about municipal networks, and the pros and cons of models for municipal networks, and GDSII. Also, and they've just been booked with a lot of other events going on. But we're going to try to get that going here in the very near future. And of course, part of that discussion is what does that mean in terms of providing low cost options for people? So it's certainly a timing, timely discussion. And for those of you who were involved with us with our creating our plan, early on in 2020, the strategic plan that we actually thanks to Mark and some of his work had actually included excuse me information and models for municipal networks. And, Mark, I don't know if you want to comment any more about that. About the plan? Yeah, well, there's not much I mean, it's, it's available. And I do have a link every day, every week on our on our meeting webpage. But anything your

comment would be that the even though we haven't reissued that, an update to that plan, the thinking from there at rolled into the tech Council public policy, recommendations, they're a big guide, not not only that year, but continue to evolve. And so there is an evolution to that very thinking that does exist in the tech Council public policy guide. And you know, that's a committee that John Kelly and Ron shot and I and Kirk Busch actively participate in. So we really do refresh the state and local Broadband policy recommendations there and help drive them where they have a lobbyist, and so on. I'll put a link if we have minutes left into the chat regarding that.

Okay. So I'm going to stop recording and if anybody wants to hang on and just keep it for a while. If not, we're kind of done for today.