Stimulus Endgame: House and Senate OK Billions for Broadband - Page 2

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A controversial amendment opposed by the Net neutrality groups also failed to make the final cut. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., had introduced a provision that would have amended the Net neutrality language to allow for "reasonable network management practices such as deterring unlawful activity, including child pornography and copyright infringement."

That amendment, supported by the entertainment industry, would have allowed ISPs to apply content-filtering technology to their networks to screen for illegal content. For groups like Public Knowledge, that would have mistakenly cast ISPs in the role of "copyright cops." The group has also warned that filtering technologies carry a margin of error, which would lead to some legal content getting blocked, a condition it says is tantamount to a violation of free speech.

Striking the Feinstein amendment from the stimulus bill is certainly a victory for Public Knowledge and others, but Art Brodsky, the group's communications director, believes that the fight over content filtering for copyright violations, backed by the entertainment industry, is far from over.

"We expect the issue to surface again," Brodsky told InternetNews.com.

Where the money goes

The bill would allocate $4.7 billion to create a Broadband Technology Opportunities Program to be administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), a division of the Commerce Department.

The money is intended to promote network enhancements in underserved parts of the country, as well as education and training programs aimed at spurring demand for broadband services.

The bill would require the NTIA to administer all of the funds by the end of fiscal 2010. Companies would be obligated to "substantially complete" their network expansion projects within two years after receiving grant money. Groups taking stimulus grants would also be required to provide the NTIA and key House and Senate committees with progress updates on their projects every 90 days.

The federal funding would be capped at 80 percent of the total cost of a project, though it provides the NTIA with some latitude in granting exceptions in cases where an applicant demonstrates a compelling financial need.

For rural areas, where broadband deployment has been hindered by the prohibitive cost of building networks for a sparse base of subscribers spread over long distances, the bill would allocate $2.5 billion to an agency within the Department of Agriculture to spur new high-speed networks.

For a project to be eligible for loans and grants from the Rural Utilities Service, 75 percent of its coverage area would have to be rural and without existing broadband service.

To guard against double-dipping, areas that stand to benefit from network-expansion projects funded by the NTIA would be ineligible for loans or grants under the rural broadband program.

The bill would also require the Federal Communications Commission to develop and report to Congress a plan for a national broadband strategy within a year.