Civil and Human Rights Coalition: FCC Overlooks Needs of Low-Income Americans

Washington, D.C. – Nancy Zirkin, executive vice president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, issued the following statement following today’s decision by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regarding reform of the high cost Universal Service Fund (USF):

“We are disappointed by the Federal Communications Commission’s failure to respond to our request that it recalibrate the USF allocation to help more low-income Americans gain access to broadband. 

Just over 30 percent of Americans have access to broadband infrastructure but do not subscribe, while only about 5 percent of Americans lack access to the infrastructure. The current allocation of USF funding is heavily weighted toward infrastructure deployment and does not reflect the relative scale of these problems.

We had urged the Commission to address the needs of low-income communities by reallocating a small fraction of today’s projected cost-savings to Lifeline, the low-income program. Unfortunately, the Commission failed to act on our recommendation.

As the Commission acknowledged, there is more work to do with respect to USF reform. We were pleased to hear the Chairman promise that the Lifeline proceeding will be completed before the end of the year and we urge him to stick to that timetable. We also urge the Chairman and the Commission to stand by their assurances to take a close look at The Leadership Conference’s recommendations as they move ahead to the next phase of USF reform, including deferring a decision to cap funding for the Lifeline program; immediately expanding the program to enable  low-income participants to purchase broadband services with their monthly subsidy; and dedicating $50 million to broadband pilot programs to develop more innovative means to bring broadband to low-income people.”

The Leadership Conference’s full USF comments and further comments are available on the FCC’s web site.

Nancy Zirkin is executive vice president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than 200 national organizations to promote and protect the rights of all persons in the United States. The Leadership Conference works toward an America as good as its ideals. For more information on The Leadership Conference and its 200-plus member organizations, visit www.civilrights.org.