FirstNet Finalizing Draft for Suspended BTOP Grantees’ Spectrum Licenses
The spectrum lease negotiations between the FirstNet board and seven suspended public safety broadband stimulus projects continue amid the 90-day window the board set at its February meeting, with both the federal government and a project leader citing progress. NTIA suspended the seven 700 MHz projects, part of its Broadband Technology Opportunities Program, last May out of fears their public safety infrastructure efforts would conflict with the $7 billion nationwide FirstNet. But they've discussed ways to reactivate the projects as FirstNet test beds, as many have urged over the last year and as the board resolved last month (CD Feb 13 p1) when kicking off the negotiations.
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FirstNet board member Sue Swenson said there have been “some very productive discussions on the draft framework for a lease agreement,” according to an update from NTIA Thursday (http://1.usa.gov/Xf1Bnh). “After we receive the projects’ written feedback on the current draft, we will be in a position to move forward in earnest with more individualized negotiations,” Swenson, the lead negotiator for NTIA, said in a statement.
The projects have named lead negotiators and have been talking as a group about what these agreements should look like, NTIA said, saying the final agreements will likely feature project-specific elements. These specific focuses will potentially include “how a project will address rural or wide area deployments, in-building coverage issues, development of public safety applications, billing and provisioning, or other specific project features that FirstNet could leverage to generate valuable lessons learned,” according to Swenson.
"I think FirstNet shares the urgency on this,” BayRICS Authority Interim General Manager Barry Fraser told us. “The negotiations are progressing ... especially in the last couple of weeks.” The BayRICS Authority is one of the seven grantees and has planned a public safety network in San Francisco. The seven suspended grantee leaders have been engaging in several discussions this week and hope to get a proposal back to NTIA before next week, he said. The focus has been to develop “terms and conditions that are consistent for all of the grantees” while noting there are “nuances” with each project, he said. “That’s just more efficient.”
The 90-day window “gives all sides the urgency,” Fraser added. That window will expire around mid-May. NTIA will make the final call on the grantees once FirstNet submits its recommendations on the projects and any proposed FirstNet spectrum leasing.
There’s “likelihood that FirstNet and Texas will commence negotiations on a spectrum lease in the near future,” NTIA said in its update, referring to the public safety network efforts in Harris County, Texas, a partnership between the state and the Harris County Information Technology Center. The FCC granted the project another six-month special temporary authority a month ago to operate in the 700 MHz band. The Texas project is not funded through the BTOP grant program and thus not suspended by NTIA like the seven grantees but has been involved with the BTOP grantee licensee negotiations as an observer, NTIA said. “FirstNet would seek to establish specific terms and conditions in any spectrum lease it considers with Texas,” it added.