FCC Offers Update on Mobility Fund Challenge Process; Pai Plans to Extend Deadline
The FCC said Friday that as of May 31, 64 entities had access to the Universal Service Administrator Co.'s Mobility Fund Phase II challenge process portal to participate in the process, two days after Chairman Ajit Pai said he would…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
extend the challenge period. Parties with access include 37 carriers required to file Form 477 data, seven state governments, six local governments, 11 tribal government entities and three "other" entities, said a public notice. The Rural Broadband Auctions Task Force and Wireless and Wireline bureaus said they will provide further updates. Pai told lawmakers he backed extending a challenge process window by 90 days for the $4.53 billion Connect America Fund Mobility Fund II, and he directed the task force "to figure out the procedural steps necessary" to do that. "By lengthening the period during which challenges can be submitted, challengers will have an opportunity to conduct additional tests, which in turn means a more accurate map for carrying out the Mobility Fund Phase II auction," Pai wrote, responding Wednesday to a bipartisan letter the same day from Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and 29 Senate colleagues posted Thursday (exchange here).