Texas Asks Feds for More Time to Meet BEAD Deadline
The state hopes to push its BEAD deadline back by more than two months to November 21.
HOUSTON, June 24, 2025 – A surprise 90-day deadline from the federal government has broadband officials working around the clock, but Texas broadband director Greg Conte, citing legal constraints and scale, said Tuesday his office has already asked Washington for more time.
“We have engaged with NTIA. We've actually submitted an extension waiver to them requesting that the shot clock in Texas be moved back,” Conte said during a keynote kicking off main day events of the Broadband Communities Summit in Houston.
“We would recapture the 78 days that were taken away from us. So, instead of a September 4 deadline, we would be working toward November 21,” Conte added. “We would still have a very short window to complete our application process if that extension request is accepted.”
FROM SPEEDING BEAD SUMMIT
Panel 1: How Are States Thinking About Reasonable Costs Now?
Panel 2: Finding the State Versus Federal Balance in BEAD
Panel 3: Reacting to the New BEAD NOFO Guidance
Panel 4: Building, Maintaining and Adopting Digital Workforce Skills
The new deadline comes as states scramble to comply with sweeping changes to the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program, announced earlier this month by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration.
Among the most disruptive changes, state officials said, was a last-minute policy shift allowing unlicensed fixed wireless providers (UFWA) to remove areas from BEAD eligibility maps.
“That was a curveball that no one expected,” said Edyn Rolls, chief strategic officer for the Oklahoma Broadband Office. “We never anticipated [UFWA] being considered a reliable form of service.”
If all locations considered to be served by UFWA on the Federal Communications Commission’s national broadband map were upheld, more than 36,000 locations in Oklahoma could be stripped from program eligibility – that’s over half of those originally deemed eligible for BEAD funding in the state.
As many as 60,000 locations could lose BEAD eligibility
In Texas, Conte said, as many as 60,000 locations – about a quarter of the state’s remaining targets – would lose BEAD eligibility.
ULFW providers have seven days to notify states of their intent to defend coverage claims, followed by another seven days to submit documentation showing that they meet BEAD standards. Previously, these providers were excluded from eligibility determinations due to interference concerns, and only factored in when a state specifically sought to fund ULFW service as a last resort.
Like in Texas, Rolls said the accelerated timeline now guiding BEAD has forced Oklahoma to overhaul years of planning in a matter of weeks. “Like many states, we’ve given up our summers and our weekends,” she said. “It’s the only way.”
“Ninety days is really fast, especially when we are going through some repetitive processes that have been integrated over the last two and a half years,” Rolls said. “That's a big responsibility, not only to redo and reinitiate, but also to make sure that we're doing it correctly and in the best way that we possibly can.”
In Oklahoma, the state was managing $768 million in federal BEAD funds to serve more than 50,000 locations currently lacking adequate internet infrastructure. The state had already closed its initial application window on May 26 and had begun the process of selecting subgrantees when the NTIA released updated guidance on June 6, introducing new scoring metrics and altering how subgrantees must be evaluated and prioritized.
In Texas, officials are managing $3.3 billion in BEAD funding. The state had initially identified roughly 700,000 unserved locations, but that number has since dropped to around 240,000, thanks to private investment, federal awards, and state-led efforts such as the Bringing Online Opportunities to Texas (BOOT) program, Conte said.
Texas hopes to prioritize speed and scalability
Conte confirmed that the state’s BEAD scoring rubric will prioritize network speed and scalability.
“We do have fiber priority in state statute,” he said. “We're looking at how to incorporate that priority within the scoring rubric, as well.”
Applicants will be evaluated across three categories totaling 100 points, Conte explained, with nearly all of them in Texas weighted toward long-term speed and scalability. “We’re putting 95 points into that bucket,” he said, adding that the goal is to stay compliant with both state law and federal guidelines.
Conte emphasized that Texas intends to use all available discretion granted under the new federal rules to ensure its program remains state-driven. “We’re trying to comply as best we can with the policy notice and run this program, because we don’t want to get to the end of this and then NTIA either commandeer all of our decisions or change them on the back end,” he said. “We want to make sure we have control over this.”
The panel was moderated by Evan Feinman, former BEAD Program Director at the NTIA, who oversaw early implementation of the program before stepping down in 2025.
Correction: An earlier version of this story said that Evan Feinman stepped down in 2024. He actually stepped down in March 2025. The story has been corrected.
