House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) issued a statement commending the House of Representatives for passing by a voice vote yesterday the Broadband Census of America Act.
The bill proposes, among other items, requiring the FCC to compare broadband deployments in the U.S. with deployments in other nations, and discontinuing the FCC practice of claiming an entire U.S. zip code has broadband access if just one resident in that zip code has access.
“Despite a pledge by President Bush to have universal broadband by 2007, recent data ranks the United States 15th in broadband deployment among industrialized nations,” Pelosi said in her statement. “The Broadband Census of America Act is a crucial first step to get to the root of this problem, as it develops a national broadband access map. By knowing where broadband is currently deployed, we can then target federal broadband resources to reach our rural and underserved communities. This bill also provides grants to local technology planning groups to help support local initiatives to bolster broadband deployment, adoption and technology literacy.”