WISPA’s Harnish and Proffer In Attendance
Friday, Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri hosted a Rural Broadband Summit in Troy, Missouri. As a keynote speaker, Senator McCaskill invited FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. Senator McCaskill opened the forum by expressing her pleasure in Chairman Genachowski’s attendance and set the stage for the discussion with her own comments.
FCC Chairman Genachowski Addresses Missouri Rural Summit
Senator McCaskill is a member of the Senate Commerce Committee and has been a long time supporter of ubiquitous Broadband services to all Missourians. She recognizes the challenges that many of her constituents in Rural Missouri face each and every day. Whether it is searching for a job without access to Broadband or running a business without Broadband, she recognizes that more needs to be done to provide these services to each and every community and household in Missouri and also across the nation.
Senator McCaskill recognized that the United States is not the leader in the World when it comes to Broadband Adoption and Accessibility. It is however essential that we become a leader to continue to pursue the American Dream. She stated that rural areas across the country are falling behind and that 30% of Rural Americans do not have access to Broadband, which creates a gaping hole and a Digital Divide. She recognizes that this Digital Divide includes a Generational Divide, Educational Divide and a Healthcare Divide. It is her intention to even the playing field between urban and rural Americans so that everyone is in a position to compete in our Global Economy.
Chairman Genachowski opened his comments by stating that the United States needs to become a leader in developing technologies and policy that stimulate innovation. He stated that high speed Broadband is our next generation communication utility and we need to embrace it fully. Broadband is an opportunity for all businesses, large and small, urban or rural to save money, create jobs, improve profits and compete globally.
Broadband is essential in solving our national challenges, be it in healthcare, education, workforce or public safety. The cost of Digital Exclusion is getting higher each day, Chairman Genachowski stated.
He also stated that the National Broadband Plan defines some goals for the country including higher Broadband speeds, ubiquitous Broadband coverage and transforming the Universal Service Fund to include Broadband services. The USF Fund has primarily funded the legacy telephone network since its adoption and now we have matured so that Broadband is now as essential to everyday life as the telephone once was. He stated that the Fund needs to “wake up each morning” and focus on getting Broadband everywhere.
FCC Chairman Genachowski Greets Victoria Proffer
Victoria Proffer of St. Louis Broadband followed the forum with a statement of how she plans on resolving the lack of Broadband in the Ozark Mountain region through her Broadband Stimulus Grant Proposal. Her grant application includes 10 counties in Rural Missouri including 3 counties which have been declared persistent poverty areas. Here proposal incorporates 116 Microwave towers, a hardened NOC, Green technologies, a public safety network and a job creation program that will extend to recipients of the Broadband services in her service area to faciltate vitual work opportunities from remote locations in the comfort of their homes. This region is extemely remote and challenged with dense foliage and rough terrain. These challenges are best overcome with fixed wireless Broadband deployments, she said.
Rick Harnish, President of the Wireless Internet Service Providers’ Association, then addressed the Chairman, Senator and the crowd.Mr. Harnish complimented the FCC for the decision to incorporate the use of “unlicensed” spectrum in the 1990’s in its spectrum policy. He relayed that the 2.4 gighertz band, one called the “junk band” has been extremely successful in driving innovation and rural broadband services. He stated that this band is now most likely one of the most used bands in the United States. He claimed that nearly every American uses this band in some way on a daily basis, whether it be wireless laptops, smartphones, baby monitors or other devices which are allowed to operate in this band. He also stated that wireless ISPs share this band to serve countless Americans with Broadband Services, often in markets which are not reached by legacy DSL, Cable and Fiber technologies.
Mr. Harnish believes that WISPA will continue to work with the FCC to fine tune the TV Whitespaces rules to facilitate Broadband adoption in spectrum especially suited because of its excellent propagation characteristics. The FCC voted to allow unlicensed operation in the TV Whitespaces in 2008 and is currently defining these rules with the stakeholders. WISPs expect to greatly enhance their ability to serve their market areas much more completely once access to these bands is granted.
The Rural Broadband Summit also included speakers from Education, Public Safety, Healthcare and Economic Development in the State of Missouri.
WISPA will be returning to Missouri on July 21st and 22nd as it holds its Summer 2010 Regional Meeting in St. Louis. WISPs and industry vendors will be traveling to St. Louis to discuss regulatory, business and technical challenges that face the industry. FCC OET Chief Julius Knapp will be a keynote speaker at this event.
[...] Proffer and others attended a regional wireless summit in Missouri, and she met FCC Chair [...]