One BEAD Requirement Making You Nervous? Ask for a Waiver

LAS VEGAS, Oct. 16, 2024 – Broadband providers on the fence about BEAD should consider applying for funding with a waiver request, experts said at WISPAPALOOZA Wednesday.

“At least an application with a waiver in there is something I can look at,” said Bree Maki, director of Minnesota’s Office of Broadband Development.

Broadband offices administering their slices of the $42.5 billion broadband grant program are required to make an effort to fund a project serving every home and business in their state, even if it means reaching out to providers directly and negotiating a bid. 

Maki said a provider applying for funds while asking to waive a portion of the program that might otherwise keep them out, like the requirement for providers to match 25 percent of project costs, would be preferable to nothing coming in at all for hard-to-reach areas. 

The state and then the National Telecommunications and Information Administration would ultimately have to approve any requested waivers, so she urged providers to be thoughtful about any waivers they do ask for.

“We will do our due diligence. But if we have no applications and no waivers, then we certainly don’t have anything to work with,” she said.

The federal government greenlighting waivers for specific projects, in addition to the targeted waivers to letter of credit and domestic manufacturing rules it granted for the whole program, isn’t a far-fetched idea, said Greg Guice, chief policy officer at Vernonburg Group.

“NTIA has been very reluctant to grant blanket waivers, but they have in conversations indicated a willingness to look at individual waivers,” he said.