96166 Federal Register / Vol. 89, No. 233 / Wednesday, December 4, 2024 / Proposed Rules 

UPL = xm = xmi·md= xmi + 0.md(xm(i+1) ¥ 

xmi

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Where: 

mi = the integer portion of m, i.e., m 

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[FR Doc. 2024–27635 Filed 12–3–24; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 6560–50–P 

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS 

COMMISSION 

47 CFR Part 54 

[WC Docket Nos. 10–90, 23–328, 16–271, 

14–58, 09–197; WT Docket No. 10–208; FCC 

24–116; FR ID 264716] 

Connect America Fund, Alaska 

Connect Fund, Connect America 

Fund—Alaska Plan, ETC Annual 

Reports and Certifications, 

Telecommunications Carriers Eligible 

To Receive Universal Service Support, 

Universal Service Reform—Mobility 

Fund 

AGENCY: Federal Communications 

Commission. 

ACTION: Proposed rule. 

SUMMARY: In this document, the Federal 

Communications Commission (FCC or 

Commission) adopted a Further Notice 

of Proposed Rulemaking (FNPRM) that 

seeks comment on the implementation 

of the Alaska Connect Fund (ACF) for 

mobile service from the period January 

1, 2030 through December 31, 2034 for 

areas where more than one mobile 

provider had been receiving support for 

overlapping service areas, or duplicatesupport areas (ACF Mobile Phase II). 

This includes comment on the 

methodology to determine support 

amounts in duplicate-support areas and 

the competitive or alternative 

mechanism to distribute support, which 

would result in support to a single 

mobile provider in duplicate-support 

areas after ACF Mobile Phase I (mobile 

support provided from January 1, 2027 

to December 31, 2029) ends. The 

Commission also seeks comment on 

how to distribute support in unserved 

areas, Tribal consent requirements for 

the ACF, and other additional issues 

that would impact the ACF. 

DATES: Comments are due on or before 

February 3, 2025, and reply comments 

are due on or before March 4, 2025. 

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, 

identified by WC Docket Nos. 10–90, 

23–328, 16–271, 14–58, 09–197 or WT 

Docket No. 10–208 by any of the 

following methods: 

• Electronic Filers: Comments may be 

filed electronically using the internet by 

accessing the Electronic Comment 

Filing System (ECFS): https://

www.fcc.gov/ecfs/. 

• Paper Filers: Parties who choose to 

file by paper must file an original and 

one copy of each filing. 

• Filings can be sent by hand or 

messenger delivery, by commercial 

courier, or by the U.S. Postal Service. 

All filings must be addressed to the 

Secretary, Federal Communications 

Commission. 

• Hand-delivered or messengerdelivered paper filings for the 

Commission’s Secretary are accepted 

between 8:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. by the 

FCC’s mailing contractor at 9050 

Junction Drive, Annapolis Junction, MD 

20701. All hand deliveries must be held 

together with rubber bands or fasteners. 

Any envelopes and boxes must be 

disposed of before entering the building. 

• Commercial courier deliveries (any 

deliveries not by the U.S. Postal Service) 

must be sent to 9050 Junction Drive, 

Annapolis Junction, MD 20701. 

• Filings sent by U.S. Postal Service 

First-Class Mail, Priority Mail, and 

Priority Mail Express must be sent to 45 

L Street NE, Washington, DC 20554. 

People with Disabilities. To request 

materials in accessible formats for 

people with disabilities (braille, large 

print, electronic files, audio format), 

send an email to fcc504@fcc.gov or call 

the Consumer & Governmental Affairs 

Bureau at 202–418–0530 (voice), 202– 

418–0432 (tty). 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For 

further information, please contact, Matt 

Warner, Competition and Infrastructure 

Policy Division, Wireless 

Telecommunications Bureau, at 

Matthew.Warner@fcc.gov or (202) 418– 

2419. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This is a 

summary of the Commission’s FNPRM 

in WC Docket Nos. 10–90, 23–328, 16– 

271, 14–58, 09–197 and WT Docket No. 

10–208; FCC 24–116, adopted on 

November 1, 2024 and released on 

November 4, 2024. The full text of this 

document is available at the following 

internet address: https://www.fcc.gov/ 

document/fcc-adopts-alaska-connectfund-further-address-broadband-needs. 

The Commission also concurrently 

adopted a Report and Order (Order) that 

takes important and necessary steps to 

ensure continued support for the 

advancement of modern mobile and 

fixed broadband service in Alaska. 

Filing Requirements. Pursuant to 

§§ 1.415 and 1.419 of the Commission’s 

rules, 47 CFR 1.415, 1.419, interested 

parties may file comments and reply 

comments on or before the dates 

indicated in this document. Comments 

may be filed using the Commission’s 

ECFS or by paper. All filings must be 

addressed to the Commission’s 

Secretary, Office of the Secretary, 

Federal Communications Commission. 

Ex Parte Rules. This proceeding shall 

be treated as a ‘‘permit-but-disclose’’ 

proceeding in accordance with the 

Commission’s ex parte rules. Persons 

making ex parte presentations must file 

a copy of any written presentation or a 

memorandum summarizing any oral 

presentation within two business days 

after the presentation (unless a different 

deadline applicable to the Sunshine 

period applies). Persons making oral ex 

parte presentations are reminded that 

memoranda summarizing the 

presentation must: (1) list all persons 

attending or otherwise participating in 

the meeting at which the ex parte 

presentation was made, and (2) 

summarize all data presented and 

arguments made during the 

presentation. If the presentation 

consisted in whole or in part of the 

presentation of data or arguments 

already reflected in the presenter’s 

written comments, memoranda, or other 

filings in the proceeding, the presenter 

may provide citations to such data or 

arguments in his or her prior comments, 

memoranda, or other filings (specifying 

the relevant page and/or paragraph 

numbers where such data or arguments 

can be found) in lieu of summarizing 

them in the memorandum. Documents 

shown or given to Commission staff 

during ex parte meetings are deemed to 

be written ex parte presentations and 

must be filed consistent with Rule 

1.1206(b), 47 CFR 1.1206(b). 

Participants in this proceeding should 

familiarize themselves with the 

Commission’s ex parte rules. 

Providing Accountability Through 

Transparency Act. Consistent with the 

Providing Accountability Through 

Transparency Act, Public Law 118–9, a 

summary of the FNPRM is available on 

https://www.fcc.gov/proposedrulemakings. 

Synopsis 

I. Further Notice of Proposed 

Rulemaking 

In this FNPRM, the Commission seeks 

comment on a number of issues related 

to the implementation of the ACF. 

As an initial matter, for ACF Mobile 

Phase II, the Commission seeks 

comment on a methodology to 

determine a support amount for areas 

where more than one mobile provider 

had been receiving support for 

overlapping service areas. This 

mechanism may also be used to 

determine support amounts to claw 


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back for areas that the Commission 

deems ineligible for mobile support in 

the concurrently adopted Report and 

Order (Order) in the event that support 

is not shifted to a comparable area. 

Additionally, the Commission seeks 

comment on ACF Mobile Phase II 

service requirements, as well as how to 

eliminate duplicative support in ACF 

Mobile Phase II so that only one 

provider would continue to receive 

funding in duplicate-support areas. 

First, the Commission seeks comment 

on a competitive mechanism for 

awarding support to one provider in 

duplicate-support areas. Second, the 

Commission seeks comment on an 

alternative mechanism to address 

duplicate-support areas that would 

designate one provider that would 

continue receiving support in the same 

area, and would allow other providers 

to choose different areas to serve to 

continue receiving the previous support 

levels. 

In addition, the Commission seeks to 

update the record on how best to deploy 

mobile service to areas that remain 

unserved with the $162 million from the 

Alaska Plan that has been reallocated 

toward this purpose. Further, the 

Commission seeks comment on 

conducting a reverse auction to award 

support to competitive Eligible 

Telecommunication Carriers (ETCs) to 

deploy advanced communications 

networks in these areas. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

additional issues for implementation of 

the mobile portion of the ACF, for both 

the two support-area plan established in 

the concurrently adopted Order and the 

ACF Mobile Phase II as described in this 

document. The Commission seeks 

comment on retail consumer conditions, 

including seeking comment on a 

proposal to impose a minimum 

subscriber requirement for ACF mobile 

participants, as well as seeking 

comment on marketing on Tribal lands. 

The Commission also seeks further 

comment on offering incentives to 

deploy networks with Open Radio 

Access Network (Open RAN). Finally, 

the Commission seeks further comment 

on Tribal consent under both the mobile 

and fixed portions of the ACF. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

how to determine support amounts by 

area for purposes of the mobile portion 

of the ACF—for example, to determine 

the support amounts for duplicatesupport areas and single-support areas, 

as well as previously supported areas 

that are no longer eligible. In the Alaska 

Plan, providers were awarded funding 

based on statewide commitments. 

Because the Commission adopts an areabased approach for the mobile portion 

of the ACF, it must establish a way to 

disaggregate total support across smaller 

geographic areas. Specifically, in order 

to address issues involving providers 

serving areas that are ineligible in the 

ACF but were eligible in the Alaska Plan 

(e.g., areas which have an unsubsidized 

provider of 5G–NR at 7/1 Mbps in an 

outdoor stationary environment or three 

or more mobile providers offering at 

least 4G LTE at 5/1 Mbps in an outdoor 

stationary environment—with at least 

one of those providers being 

unsubsidized—based on Broadband 

Data Collection (BDC) coverage data as 

of December 31, 2024), the Commission 

must calculate how much support has 

been allocated to these ineligible areas. 

In the Alaska Connect Fund Notice, 88 

FR 80238, November 17, 2023, the 

Commission asked if duplicate funds 

could be redistributed ‘‘by calculating 

the support that eligible providers are 

receiving per hexagon across all of that 

provider’s service areas and subtracting 

the support that the provider receives 

per hexagon in a particular service 

area?’’ As no commenters directly 

addressed this question, the 

Commission seeks comment on the 

methodology in the following to 

calculate Alaska Plan support in 

specific areas, at the hex-9 level. 

Because mobile providers have 

statewide buildout requirements under 

the Alaska Plan, calculating a provider’s 

rate of support in any given area is 

particularly complicated, since 

providers that receive support to cover 

multiple areas are not required to spend 

that money in any particular area. A 

provider’s average rate of support over 

all areas is likely not to reflect the 

amount of support it uses to cover any 

particular area. However, the average 

support rate for a provider that receives 

support for a more targeted area is more 

likely to reflect the amount of support 

that the provider needs to cover that 

area. Based on that assumption, the 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

to iterate through the Alaska Plan 

participants, from smallest footprint to 

largest, using the smaller providers’ 

support as proxies for the support for 

larger providers in areas where they 

overlap. 

To provide a detailed example of the 

information in this document, the 

Commission would first consider the 

support of the provider covering the 

fewest number of hex-9s located in 

Alaska Plan eligible census blocks 

(Provider A). Specifically, the 

Commission would divide Provider A’s 

annual support by the total number of 

hex-9s that the provider covers in 

Alaska Plan eligible census blocks to 

calculate an average value for each 

covered hex-9. A hex-9 would be 

considered covered by a provider if 70% 

of the grandchild hex-11s were covered 

at the centroid, using the union of 

December 2024 BDC mobile broadband 

and mobile voice coverage for that 

provider. For example, if Provider A 

receives $100,000 in annual support and 

covers 1,000 hex-9s in Alaska Plan 

eligible blocks, each such hex-9 it 

covers would be said to receive $100 in 

annual support. 

The Commission would then evaluate 

the support of the provider covering the 

second fewest hex-9s in Alaska Plan 

eligible census blocks (Provider B). The 

Commission would first determine if 

Provider B covered any of the same hex9s as Provider A. If so, the value of those 

hex-9s would be the same as for 

Provider A; in this example, $100 per 

hex-9. The Commission would subtract 

the funding of these duplicate hex-9s 

from Provider B’s total annual support, 

and divide the remaining annual 

support by the remaining covered hex9s to calculate the funding for each hex9 that is not duplicated by Provider A. 

To continue the example, suppose 

Provider B receives $150,000 in annual 

support and covers 2,500 hex-9s in 

Alaska Plan eligible blocks, and that 500 

of these hex-9s are also covered by 

Provider A. In this case, the 

Commission would say that 500 of its 

hex-9s would each be assigned a value 

of $100, for a total of $50,000. The 

Commission would then calculate that 

the remaining $100,000 of support 

spread across the remaining 2,000 hex9s results in each non-duplicate hex-9 

receiving $50 of support. Alternatively, 

if there were no overlap between 

Providers A and B, the calculation for 

Provider B would follow the same 

process as Provider A, distributing 

$150,000 across the 2,500 hex-9s, 

resulting in each hex-9 covered by 

Provider B receiving $60 of support. 

This process would be repeated with 

the provider covering the next largest 

area, or Provider C, such that its hex-9s 

that overlap with Provider A would be 

valued the same as for Provider A ($100 

in the above example), the hex-9s that 

overlap with Provider B would be 

valued the same as for Provider B ($50 

in the above example), and the 

remaining hex-9s as the average of the 

remaining support. (Note that if 

Providers A, B, and C all overlap in 

some hex-9s, the value would be at 

Provider A’s average, or $100 in this 

example). The process would then 

iterate through the remaining providers, 

smallest to largest in terms of covered 

hex-9s in eligible Alaska Plan blocks, 

until a value has been assigned for every 

covered hex-9. Note that it would 


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theoretically be possible for the largest 

of the eight Alaska Plan providers to 

have hex-9s valued at each of the 

smaller seven provider’s averages, and 

then have its own average for its 

remaining hex-9s. 

Further, the Commission would also 

use these values to determine the 

amount of ACF support at stake in areas 

no longer eligible in the ACF. 

Continuing the example in this 

document, if 100 of Provider B’s nonduplicate hex-9s were no longer eligible, 

the value of those hex-9s would be 

$5,000. If Provider B were not able to 

commit to cover comparable hex-9s in 

its performance plan, its annual ACF 

support would be reduced by $5,000. 

Similarly, if the 100 ineligible hex-9s 

were covered by both Providers A and 

B, the value of each hex-9 would be 

$100, and the at-stake ACF support 

would be $10,000 for each provider. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

the methodology in this document. 

Should hex-9s covered by more than 

one provider have the same value to 

each provider, or should the 

Commission adopt a different method 

that allows for heterogenous support 

levels for such hex-9s? Should the 

Commission instead apportion support 

based on another metric, such as 

covered BSLs or population? Should 

hex-9s within the same geographic area, 

such as a census tract or borough, all be 

assigned the same value, regardless of 

whether or not a given hex-9 is covered 

by more than one provider? 

The Commission also seeks comment 

on whether to use this methodology to 

determine support amounts by area for 

use in a competitive—or alternative— 

mechanism for addressing duplicate 

support in ACF Mobile Phase II. The 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

this would be an effective methodology 

for determining duplicate support 

amounts. Additionally, the Commission 

seeks comment on the effectiveness of 

this methodology to calculate the 

amount of support to be clawed back in 

the event that a provider serving areas 

deemed ineligible for ACF, as set forth 

in the concurrently adopted Order, is 

not able to—or chooses not to—serve 

comparable areas. Further, the 

Commission asks whether it should use 

this or a similar hex-9-based 

methodology to calculate the value of 

ACF Phase I commitments. Are there 

other uses for this methodology in the 

mobile portion of the ACF? Finally, if 

commenters have concern about this 

methodology, the Commission seeks 

comment on alternative methodologies 

to calculate support amounts for these 

particular areas. The Commission seeks 

comment generally regarding how to 

determine the support amounts per area. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

the level of service that it should expect 

from mobile providers that receive 

support under ACF Mobile Phase II of 

the ACF. Since the adoption of the 

Alaska Plan Order, 81 FR 69696, 

October 7, 2016, mobile wireless 

technologies have advanced 

significantly, and the Commission has 

moved toward supporting 5G–NR as the 

standard for high-cost mobile-wireless 

deployment. Despite this, the current 

Alaska Plan still supports 2G, 3G, and 

4G LTE networks. While the 

Commission recognizes that Alaska 

presents unique challenges when 

deploying mobile networks, it also must 

recognize the advances in mobile 

wireless technologies that have been 

made since the adoption of the Alaska 

Plan; therefore the Commission 

tentatively concludes that continuing to 

fund such obsolete technologies would 

be both inefficient and contrary to the 

Commission’s statutory mandate that 

consumers in rural and high-cost areas 

‘‘should have access to’’ advanced 

communications ‘‘that are reasonably 

comparable to those services provided 

in urban areas.’’ As such, for ACF 

Mobile Phase II, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether to set a goal of 

5G–NR 7/1 Mbps or whether to make 

this a requirement of ACF Mobile Phase 

II. Given that 4G LTE at 5/1 Mbps is 

already available in many parts of 

Alaska, particularly in areas with 

duplicate support, the Commission 

believes that this service level is 

achievable, and it seeks comment on 

this. However, the Commission provides 

a preference for higher deployment 

speeds when selecting winners in the 

competitive mechanisms, and therefore 

it expects that providers will be 

incentivized to offer 5G–NR 35/3 Mbps 

services in areas where it is technically 

and financially feasible. The 

Commission seeks comment on this 

approach. Alternatively, should the 

Commission make 5G–NR 35/3 Mbps 

the technology and speed goal 

(consistent with its approach for singlesupport areas by 2034, as in the 

concurrently adopted Order)? Should 

the Commission make this a 

requirement? 

Additionally, if the Commission were 

to adopt a 5G–NR goal or minimum 

standard, should there be areas where 

providers are allowed to meet a lesser 

speed standard? For example, should 

areas with high middle-mile costs be 

required to deploy 5G–NR but only be 

required to meet a lower speed 

threshold, and if so, how would the 

Commission determine areas with high 

transport costs? Should the goal or 

minimum service requirements be lower 

for providers seeking to deploy in 

unserved areas? In the alternative, 

should the Commission continue to 

fund 4G LTE networks, and if so, under 

what conditions? If the Commission 

adopts 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps as the goal or 

minimum performance standard, how 

much time should it give carriers to 

upgrade their networks to meet this new 

standard? Should the adopted service 

goal or minimum deployment standard 

evolve over time to a higher standard so 

that it does not become outdated? 

The Commission seeks comment on 

the appropriate mechanism to eliminate 

duplicate support in the mobile portion 

of the ACF. It is generally not the policy 

of the Universal Service Fund (USF) to 

subsidize competition in high-cost 

areas. Therefore, in the high-cost 

program, the Commission has sought to 

eliminate duplicate support—the 

provision of support to more than one 

competitive ETC in the same area. In the 

Alaska Connect Fund Notice, the 

Commission expressed concern that 

many areas were receiving duplicate 

support under the Alaska Plan. To 

address the issue of duplicate support, 

in this document, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether to adopt a 

competitive mechanism to decide which 

competitive ETC should be awarded the 

support for a given geographic area 

based on which provider proposes the 

best combination of coverage and 

service offerings for each community. 

Under this proposal, providers seeking 

to be chosen as the provider for a given 

community will submit proposed 

coverage maps for the areas where more 

than one provider currently receives 

support, as well as the surrounding 

community where no provider currently 

offers service (i.e., unserved hex-9s 

within a larger geography that contains 

the duplicate support hex-9s). Based on 

these coverage map offers, the 

competitive mechanism would then 

determine which competitive ETC to 

support based on which provider 

proposes to deploy the 5G network with 

the best combination of speed and 

coverage to the duplicate-support areas 

and surrounding unserved areas. The 

Commission seeks comment on this 

approach. 

As discussed in the concurrently 

adopted Order, in ACF Mobile Phase I, 

the Commission limits support to 

mobile ETCs that participated in the 

Alaska Plan, subject to other eligibility 

requirements. However, for ACF Mobile 

Phase II, in order to maximize 

competition in the competitive 

mechanism, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether to permit any 


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competitive ETC, including competitive 

ETCs that do not already receive 

support for mobile service in remote 

Alaska, to be eligible to participate. The 

Commission believes that this approach 

would encourage new mobile providers 

to emerge in Alaska, including those 

that are not currently ETCs or that were 

not eligible for the Alaska Plan. The 

Commission sees no reason why a 

mobile provider that meets all other 

criteria to participate in a competitive 

process should be deemed ineligible 

solely because it is not currently 

receiving Alaska Plan support. The 

Commission tentatively concludes that 

this approach will stretch its scarce 

universal service dollars further and 

result in better service for Alaskans, and 

it seeks comment on this tentative 

conclusion. The Commission seeks 

comment on whether these are the 

appropriate eligibility criteria and 

whether any additional factors should 

be considered. 

As mentioned in this document, 

several current participants in the 

Alaska Plan have failed to meet their 

commitments. In the concurrently 

adopted Order, the Commission 

determined that an Alaska Plan mobile 

provider participant may have its ACF 

support delayed, reduced, or may be 

deemed ineligible from the ACF, if the 

Wireless Telecommunications Bureau 

(WTB) determines that the provider has 

failed to comply with the public interest 

obligations or other terms and 

conditions of the Alaska Plan or its 

Alaska Plan commitments, or failed to 

meet a build-out milestone. This 

determination—and delegation to 

WTB—extends to eligibility to 

participate in the mechanisms the 

Commission discusses in this 

document. In short, Alaska Plan 

providers that have been deemed 

ineligible for ACF will be ineligible for 

ACF Mobile Phase II support. The 

Commission seeks comment on this 

approach. Should there be a process by 

which an ineligible provider under 

these criteria could be once again 

deemed eligible? 

As discussed in the concurrently 

adopted Order, the Commission will 

determine whether an area is ineligible, 

a duplicate-support area, a singlesupport area, or unserved at the hex-9 

level. The Commission seeks comment 

on whether only eligible duplicate 

support and unserved hex-9s should be 

eligible for support in the competitive 

mechanism. Under this proposal, single 

support hex-9s and ineligible hex-9s 

will both be ineligible for support in the 

competitive mechanism. The 

Commission also seeks comment on 

whether to aggregate eligible hex-9s into 

census tracts as the minimum 

geographic unit for which it will accept 

competing offers. Should the 

Commission use an alternative Census 

geography for accepting competing 

offers? Alternatively, should eligible 

hex-9s be aggregated into a lower 

resolution (larger) hexagon such as a 

hex-7? The Commission seeks comment 

on these proposals. 

Based on the previously discussed 

methodology for determining the 

amount of support associated with each 

hex-9, the Commission seeks comment 

on whether to establish a budget for 

each census tract with duplicate support 

areas as follows. After determining the 

support for each duplicate support hex9, based on the disaggregation of 

statewide support methodology the 

Commission adopts, it seeks comment 

on whether to establish a total duplicate 

support amount for each census tract 

with duplicate support areas that is 

equal to the sum, over all duplicate 

support hex-9s, of the calculated 

support amount for each duplicate 

support hex-9. If the duplicate support 

amount associated with each hex-9 is 

different by provider based on the 

adopted disaggregation methodology, 

the Commission seeks comment on 

whether the total support amount 

associated with a tract with duplicate 

support areas should be equal to the 

sum of the maximum amounts of 

duplicate support any provider receives 

for the eligible duplicate support hex-9s. 

In this case, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether to use the sum of 

these maximum amounts so that it 

ensures support is sufficient to maintain 

the existing available coverage within 

the duplicate support areas. Would this 

approach provide sufficient support to, 

at a minimum, maintain existing 

coverage? Would this level of support 

allow the awarded provider to enhance 

its coverage within the supported hex9s to provide 5G–NR services? Would 

an alternative budget such as the total 

support associated with all supported 

providers in the duplicate support areas 

be a more appropriate amount, and if so, 

why? 

For each census tract with duplicate 

support areas, the Commission seek 

comment on whether an eligible ETC 

could submit a proposal to be the sole 

recipient of the duplicate support 

amount for the census tract. Under this 

approach, a competitive ETC’s proposal 

would consist of a proposed coverage 

map for a census tract that complies 

with the BDC mobile coverage data 

requirements and must predict 5G–NR 

coverage in an outdoor stationary 

environment. The Commission seeks 

comment on whether eligible ETCs may 

propose to cover a subset of the eligible 

areas within a tract with 5G–NR 7/1 

Mbps service or 5G–NR 35/3 Mbps 

service, and that they would be required 

to submit separate coverage maps for 

each proposed service. The Commission 

seeks comment on these proposals. In 

order to ensure that coverage map 

proposals are comparable, should the 

Commission set uniform propagation 

model parameters for all submitted 

coverage maps? Alternatively, could an 

eligible ETC’s bid be more general 

within a biddable area, such that it 

promises to deploy to a certain number 

of hex-9s with a specified level of 

service, but does not specify exactly 

which hex-9s? 

For each census tract receiving 

coverage offers, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether to evaluate the 

proposals and determine a single 

winner for each area based on a 

combination of the scope of proposed 

geographic coverage and service levels 

to the eligible areas within the tract, as 

determined by submitted coverage 

maps. The Commission seeks comment 

on this approach. Specifically, based on 

the coverage maps submitted, the 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

it should calculate a weighted percent 

coverage of the eligible hex-9s in the 

census tract for each proposal received 

and award the entire duplicate support 

amount for the tract to the ETC that 

proposes the highest weighted percent 

coverage of eligible hex-9s. In this 

calculation, hex-9s would receive 

different weights depending on whether 

they would be covered with 7/1 Mbps 

or 35/3 Mbps 5G–NR service under a 

proposal. For the weights, the 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

35/3 Mbps 5G–NR service should 

receive a weight equal to 1 and 7/1 

Mbps 5G–NR service should receive a 

weight equal to .9 when calculating the 

weighted coverage percentage used to 

evaluate competing proposals. 

For example, suppose that there are 

ten hex-9s in a tract with a total land 

area of approximately 1 square mile— 

eight eligible hex-9s and two ineligible 

hex-9s, one of which is served at 5G–NR 

at 7/1 Mbps minimum speed by an 

unsubsidized provider and one of which 

is a single support area. Suppose that 

two ETCs submit coverage maps for this 

tract and the first ETC proposes to serve 

2 of the eligible hex-9s at 5G–NR 35/3 

Mbps minimum speed service, and 3 of 

the eligible hex-9s at 5G–NR at 7/1 

Mbps minimum speed service. In this 

case, under the weighting scheme, the 

weighted coverage percentage for this 

offer would be approximately equal to 

47%. Further suppose that the second 

ETC proposes to serve 6 eligible hex-9s 


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with 5G–NR at 7/1 Mbps minimum 

speed. The approximate score for this 

second proposal would be 54%, and 

therefore, this second ETC would be the 

winner of the budget assigned to this 

tract in the competitive mechanism. 

Minimum Acceptable Offers. The 

Commission also seeks comment on the 

minimum acceptable weighted coverage 

percentage for an offer and whether it 

should be the weighted coverage 

percentage that would be implied by the 

current combined service areas of all the 

supported ETCs in the eligible hex-9s 

assuming 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps service in 

the hex-9s where such services are 

currently unavailable, and the actual 

5G–NR deployed service in hex-9s 

where 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps or 35/3 Mbps 

services are deployed. For example, in 

the previous example, if two eligible 

hex-9s had 4G LTE 5/1 Mbps service, 

one had 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps and one had 

5G–NR 35/3 Mbps, then the minimum 

acceptable coverage percentage for an 

offer would be approximately 37%. The 

Commission seeks comment on 

whether, if a provider submits an offer 

below the minimum coverage 

percentage or any other minimum 

criteria the Commission establishes, 

WTB should notify the provider and 

provide one opportunity for the 

provider to correct its bid. After this 

process, offers that remain below this 

minimum coverage percentage would be 

rejected. The Commission seeks 

comment on this approach. 

Tie Breaker. Finally, in the event that 

more than one proposal should tie when 

calculating the highest weighted 

coverage percentage, the Commission 

seeks comment on what procedure 

should be used to break such a tie. 

Should the provider with the current 

highest weighted coverage percentage be 

awarded the support given that this 

provider has demonstrated a willingness 

and ability to serve the broader 

community with the most advanced 

mobile wireless services? Should the tie 

be broken at random? Should offers also 

include the lowest support amount 

below the available budget that the 

provider would be willing to accept in 

order to deploy the proposed service 

and, only in the case of ties for highest 

weighted coverage percentage, the 

provider with the lowest support 

amount would win and receive the 

support amount requested? To the 

extent a provider already receives 

support in the ACF, should the 

Commission consider the progress 

carriers have made in their singlesupport areas as indicated in the 

December 31, 2029 progress reports? 

The Commission seeks comment on 

these proposals for accepting and 

evaluating competing offers in order to 

resolve duplicate support. Should the 

scoring of offers include other criteria 

besides proposed geographic coverage 

and service levels? For example, should 

the number of covered BSLs and road 

miles be explicitly included in the 

scoring formula? Are the weights the 

Commission seeks comment on for the 

two service levels appropriate? Should 

more weight be given to 5G–NR 35/3 

Mbps service? Should other service 

levels be considered? Should providers 

be allowed to submit multiple offers 

that include a minimum support 

amount the provider would be willing 

to accept to deploy the proposed service 

level of the offer, and if so, how should 

the Commission trade off coverage and 

requested support when determining 

winners? Should the minimum coverage 

percentage in a census tract instead be 

set at the highest weighted coverage 

percentage of any single provider in the 

duplicate-support area under a 

minimum 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps service 

level assumption? Should the 

Commission also impose a minimum 

acceptable criterion on offers that all 

areas that currently have service (e.g., a 

hex-9) would need to still have service 

under any proposal that it would accept 

as a valid proposal? Instead of only 

evaluating offers based on the eligible 

duplicate support and unserved areas 

within a tract, should the Commission 

also include ineligible single support 

areas within the tract when calculating 

the score in order to ensure that service 

is maintained to these areas? The 

Commission seeks comment on these 

questions and on any modifications that 

should be made to the methodology for 

evaluating competing offers and 

determining winners. 

Support Phase-Down. The 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

providers that are not chosen as the sole 

recipient of the duplicate-support 

amount within a tract should have their 

support phased down over two years. 

Specifically, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether losing providers 

should receive two-thirds of their 

support for the first twelve months 

following the announcement of winners, 

one-third of their support for the next 

twelve months, and zero support for the 

tract thereafter. The Commission seeks 

comment on this approach and any 

alternatives. Is a phase-down of support 

appropriate? Is two years a sufficient 

length of time for the phase-down? 

The Commission also seeks comment 

on an alternative mechanism that would 

assign support to only a single provider 

if an eligible area is covered by two or 

more Alaska Plan mobile provider 

participants. At a high level, this 

approach would take into consideration 

the existing coverage of each supported 

provider within a potentially larger area 

that includes the duplicate-support 

area—balancing various factors—and 

award support for the duplicate-support 

area to the provider that demonstrates 

the ‘‘best’’ coverage. Unlike the 

competitive mechanism, this approach 

would look at past service deployments 

rather than evaluating offers for future 

service deployments. For a currently 

supported provider that is not selected 

to continue receiving support for an area 

under the alternative mechanism, the 

Commission would make available an 

option to negotiate a revised plan with 

WTB that would allow it to continue to 

receive the same or similar level of 

support in exchange for serving 

different, but comparable, currently 

unserved areas. The Commission seeks 

comment on various aspects of this 

approach. 

Evaluation Areas. In the concurrently 

adopted Order, the Commission defines 

duplicate-support areas as eligible areas 

covered by two or more Alaska Plan 

participants. For this alternative 

mechanism, the Commission seeks 

comment on criteria for deeming a 

potentially larger and more 

standardized area as the basis for 

evaluating the service provided by each 

of multiple supported carriers and 

selecting a single carrier to receive 

support for the eligible duplicatesupport hex-9s within that area. 

Specifically, the Commission would 

consider a census tract as the evaluation 

area, and it seeks comment on whether 

census tracts would be large enough to 

provide sufficient scale for the selected 

provider but not so large as to create 

overlaps with areas where other 

providers may be receiving duplicate 

support. Would census blocks be a more 

reasonable size as evaluation areas? 

Alternatively, should the evaluation 

area be constructed based on the 

particular duplicate support situation, 

such as an aggregation of smaller 

adjacent census geographies, such as 

blocks? The Commission seeks 

comment on these options and generally 

on the criteria to be considered when 

determining an evaluation area that 

includes the hex-9s deemed to have 

duplicate support and the adjacent 

coverage areas of the supported 

providers. 

Evaluating Mobile Technology. The 

Commission also seeks comment on 

how to evaluate a subsidized provider’s 

service in a covered hex-9 with respect 

to mobile technology. For example, 

should the Commission differentiate 

among four categories of service in a 

hex-9: 2G and 3G service; 4G–LTE; 5G– 


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NR at 7/1 Mbps; and 5G–NR at 35/3 

Mbps or better? If the component hex11s in a hex-9 indicate service of 

different mobile technologies, should 

the Commission deem the hex-9 as 

covered by the most frequently 

indicated technology in the covered 

hex-11s, or in the case of an equal split 

between mobile technologies, of the 

more advanced technology offered by 

the provider? Should the Commission 

instead not differentiate between mobile 

technologies in evaluating coverage, and 

consider an area either served or not? 

Alternatively, should the Commission 

differentiate among fewer than four 

mobile technologies, and if so, what 

should they be? Should the Commission 

use a different method to assign a 

technology to a hex-9 when the 

component hex-11s show different 

mobile technologies? 

The Commission seeks comment on 

whether and, if so, how to weight 

differently the hex-9s in an evaluation 

area that are deemed to show coverage 

by different technologies. For example, 

if half of the hex-9s in a provider’s 

footprint in an area show coverage at 3G 

speeds, and the other half receive 4G 

LTE service, should the Commission 

weight the 4G–LTE areas more heavily 

when evaluating the overall coverage of 

a supported provider? For this purpose, 

the Commission suggests weighting 2G 

and 3G service as .75, 4G LTE service 

at 1, 5G–NR at 7/1 Mbps at 1.15; and 

5G–NR at 35/3 Mbps and higher speeds 

of service at 1.25. These weights would 

essentially use 4G LTE service as a 

benchmark, with slower service carrying 

less weight while faster service would 

count more heavily in the evaluation of 

a provider’s existing coverage. If 

commenters disagree with this approach 

or with the suggested weights, the 

Commission asks that they suggest a 

different approach or different weights 

and explain why they believe their 

alternative approach is preferable. As an 

additional weight, should the 

Commission evaluate progress of 

upgraded deployments demonstrated in 

the December 31, 2029 progress reports 

for single-support areas, and if so, how 

should it do so? 

Superior Coverage Calculation. In 

order to compare two or more supported 

providers that serve an area, this 

approach—on which the Commission 

seeks comment—would consider their 

technology-weighted service 

performance and the geographic extent 

of their footprint. The Commission 

would, for each provider, determine an 

area-specific score calculated as the sum 

of the weighted hex-9s that they serve. 

As a simple example, a provider that 

serves 1000 hex-9s in an evaluation area 

at 3G speeds would have a score of 

1000*.75, or 750. Another provider that 

serves 800 hex-9s in the evaluation area 

with 4G–LTE would have a score of 800. 

The Commission suggests these two 

criteria—coverage within the geographic 

evaluation area and technology— 

because they provide for a simple, 

measurable, and transparent method for 

comparing coverage that captures 

essential components of a provider’s 

service offering. How should the 

Commission select a single provider if 

two or more providers cover 100% of 

the evaluation area at the same 

technology, or otherwise have a tied 

score? Should the Commission then 

look to a broader area to evaluate the 

providers’ coverage, such as the census 

block group, census tract level, or an 

alternate geographic area? 

The Commission is mindful, however, 

that there are other aspects of a 

supported provider’s performance that 

also matter to consumers. Should other 

factors, such as price or reliability, be 

considered in a supported provider’s 

score? Would it be feasible to find 

standardized, measurable, and 

transparent ways to incorporate these or 

other factors? Would consideration of 

any such factors contribute significantly 

to the fairness of the comparison across 

duplicate supported providers? Will the 

requirements in ACF Mobile Phase I 

serve to ensure that a provider receiving 

support as of the start of ACF Mobile 

Phase II already meets basic price and/ 

or reliability (or other) criteria, 

mitigating any need to incorporate the 

criteria explicitly into the scoring 

approach? The Commission seeks 

comment on these aspects of the 

approach. 

Under this approach, the provider 

with the highest score in the evaluation 

area would be selected to continue to 

receive support for the previously 

duplicate support area. The Commission 

would calculate the support amount as 

set forth in this document, where 

generally support for a provider would 

be based on the support rate of the 

provider with the smaller footprint. 

Under this approach, the single winner 

of support for hex-9s that it and another 

provider both previously covered would 

receive a support amount based on the 

number of previous duplicate support 

hex-9s in the evaluation area. Its 

support amount for areas within the 

evaluation area for which it was a 

single-supported provider—for which it 

has guaranteed support through 

December 31, 2034—would not be 

affected. That is, the winning provider 

would receive support at a new rate for 

the previous duplicate support areas 

and continue to receive support at its 

existing rate for any hex-9s for which it 

has been receiving support as a single 

provider. 

Alternative Evaluation Criteria. 

Rather than evaluate a provider’s 

current performance based on the extent 

of coverage within the geographic 

evaluation area and the technology and 

speed that it offers, the Commission 

seeks comment on alternative means of 

evaluation that would select a single 

supported provider based solely on 

which of the duplicate support 

recipients offers service to the largest 

number of hex-9s within the evaluation 

area. The Commission seeks comment 

on this and other possible approaches 

that are consistent with the actions of 

the concurrently adopted Order. 

Performance Requirements. Once 

selected as the winning provider for the 

evaluation area, the Commission would 

require that the provider meet the 

minimum standard of deployment for 

support under ACF Mobile Phase II of 

5G–NR 7/1 Mbps measured in an 

outdoor stationary environment. 

Loss of Support. Under this approach, 

on which the Commission seeks 

comment, providers that lose their 

support in a duplicate-support area 

would be subject to phase down of 

support. Providers would lose support 

subject to a phase down schedule of 2/ 

3 support for the first twelve months, 1/ 

3 support for the next twelve months, 

and zero support thereafter. In the 

alternative, the Commission seeks 

comment on allowing providers that 

lose duplicate support to deploy to 

comparable unserved hex-9s in other 

areas of Alaska. Under this approach, 

providers that have their performance 

plans approved by providing 

comparable service to hex-9s in an 

uncovered location would have their 

lost support resume from the date that 

the performance plan is approved. The 

Commission seeks comment on this 

approach. Should there be any 

differences in the loss of support 

approach depending on how the 

provider loses support between the 

competitive and alternative mechanism? 

In the Alaska Plan Order, 81 FR 

69696, October 7, 2016, the Commission 

reallocated funds going to support the 

provision of mobile service in unserved 

remote areas in Alaska and decided to 

distribute those reallocated funds 

through a reverse auction process. In the 

Alaska Plan Order, unserved areas were 

defined as ‘‘those census blocks where 

less than 15% of the population within 

the census block was within any mobile 

carrier’s coverage area.’’ By December 

31, 2026, that allocation will amount to 

$162 million. The Commission provided 

that support for unserved areas would 


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be distributed through a reverse auction 

process, subject to the competitive 

bidding rules codified at Part 1 Subpart 

AA of the Commission’s rules. The 

Alaska Plan Order stated that ‘‘[a]ny 

competitive ETC, including competitive 

ETCs that do not otherwise receive 

support for mobile service in remote 

Alaska, may bid in the auction to 

receive annual support through the 

remainder of the Plan term to extend 

service to areas that do not have 

commercial mobile radio service as of 

December 31, 2014.’’ The Commission 

wishes to refresh the record on this 

approach and update the definition of 

unserved areas. The Commission seeks 

comment on a potential auction 

mechanism for assigning support to 

provide service in areas that are 

currently unserved by any provider. The 

Commission first addresses several 

high-level program elements and then 

describe a reverse auction mechanism, 

which would use competitive bidding to 

determine how best to apportion the 

available budget to maximize new 

service to Alaskans in places where they 

live, work, and travel that have 

heretofore been ignored. The auction 

mechanism on which the Commission 

seeks comment would leverage 

competition across areas to determine 

the areas that will receive support 

through the auction and, in areas where 

more than one bidder is competing, the 

auction would additionally leverage 

competition between bidders to 

determine a single winner of support. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

continuing with the prior decision to 

open up the unserved areas auction to 

any competitive ETC certified in Alaska 

at the commencement of the auction, 

including competitive ETCs that do not 

already receive support for mobile 

service in remote Alaska. The 

Commission suggests this broad 

eligibility requirement in order to attract 

a wide pool of potential service 

providers, recognizing that the technical 

and business approaches consistent 

with providing service to areas that have 

remained unserved may require 

expertise and technology different than 

that of the carriers that traditionally 

have provided service in Alaska. In 

addition, the potential availability of 

new middle-mile capacity may make it 

feasible for new entities to enter the 

market in these (and potentially other) 

eligible areas. 

The Commission seeks comment on a 

term of support of eight years, which is 

the same period of time that mobile 

providers will receive support in singlesupport areas. This will allow time for 

mobile-support recipients to buildout 

and maintain a communications 

network for remote communities and 

reassess any ongoing support needs to 

these areas. After that eight-year period, 

the Commission would reassess any 

ongoing support needs. 

The Commission also seeks comment 

on the public-interest obligations that a 

winning bidder will have in exchange 

for receiving ACF support for serving a 

previously unserved area. For example, 

the Commission would require the 

winning provider to offer 5G–NR service 

at 7/1 Mbps to at least 85% of the 

eligible unserved hex-9s in the area by 

December 31, 2034. The Commission 

seeks comment on these standards with 

respect to technology and speed, 

geographic coverage, and timing. 

Should the Commission instead 

establish performance obligations in 

stages, for example, requiring less 

geographic coverage at a 2- or 3-year 

benchmark, more coverage at 5 years, 

with full coverage required by year 6, or 

other staged requirements? Should the 

Commission require a greater or lower 

technology and speed, or allow a mix of 

such? Should obligations vary according 

to the type of service to be provided, 

such as requiring greater coverage if 

provided by satellite, or less coverage 

depending upon access to middle-mile? 

The Alaska Plan Order defined an 

unserved area as ‘‘[a] census block [ ] 

where less than 15% of the population 

within the census block was within any 

mobile carrier’s coverage area,’’ as of 

December 31, 2014. The Commission 

finds this definition to be out of date. 

The Commission seeks comment on an 

alternative approach whereby it would 

first determine an area’s eligibility at the 

hex-9 level, rather than at the censusblock level, consistent with the 

concurrently adopted Order regarding 

areas receiving support. In order to 

determine that a hex-9 is unserved for 

purposes of the auction, BDC data 

would have to indicate that no carrier 

provides mobile data service as shown 

at the centroids of 70% of the 

component hex-11s that comprise the 

hex-9. The Commission would also 

determine whether an area includes at 

least one BSL (as defined by the Fabric) 

for the hex-9. If a hex-9 is deemed 

uncovered, contains at least one BSL 

and is otherwise eligible for ACF 

support, then the hex-9 would be 

deemed unserved. 

However, because hex-9s are very 

small relative to the size of mobile 

deployment areas, the Commission 

intends that participants in a reverse 

auction would bid at the level of a larger 

geographic area, such as a census block, 

census block group, or census tract. For 

the larger geographic area to be 

considered unserved, the Commission 

would require that 85% of the eligible 

hex-9s in the larger geographic area be 

deemed unserved. The Commission 

seeks comment on the use of census 

block, census block group, or census 

tract as the biddable area for the 

auction. Is there another well-defined 

geographic area that would be more 

appropriate for an auction to assign 

support to currently unserved areas in 

Alaska? Would a larger hexagonal area 

in the H3 system, such as a hex-5 

(approximately 253 sq. kms) or hex-6 

(approximately 36 sq. kms.) be 

preferred? Biddable areas based on a 

larger H3 system hexagon would be of 

a more uniform size than census tracts 

or blocks. Would potential bidders 

consider that an advantage? Is it 

important that the geographic areas used 

in this reverse auction be the same as 

those used for any support mechanism 

for areas that are currently served by at 

least one subsidized provider? Are there 

any classes of hex-9s without at least 

one BSL that should be considered 

eligible for support if uncovered? 

Second, the Commission seeks 

comment on whether there is a 

minimum speed or technology level 

above which a hex-9 would be deemed 

served. In the 5G Fund Second Report 

and Order, an area is eligible if there is 

not an unsubsidized 5G provider of 7/ 

1 Mbps service in an outdoor stationary 

environment; however, the 5G Fund 

Second Report and Order’s goal is to 

bring 5G to areas without 5G, instead of 

bringing 5G to unserved areas. Given 

that the Alaska Plan’s goal was to get to 

4G LTE, the Commission thinks a 

number of otherwise served areas will 

be defined as unserved if it uses the 

threshold from the 5G Fund Second 

Report and Order. Rather, the 

Commission suggests that eligible areas 

with no service, not even voice service, 

will be deemed unserved for the 

unserved areas auction in Alaska. The 

Commission seeks comment on the 

speed and technology threshold that, if 

unavailable, should be considered for an 

area to be deemed unserved. 

Are there other approaches to 

determining eligible areas and biddable 

areas for the reverse auction that would 

allow for an accurate, transparent, and 

careful evaluation of an area’s suitability 

to be considered for support through a 

reverse auction? Should the 

Commission consider criteria other than 

those it has laid out to determine 

whether an area is considered eligible 

for the unserved areas auction? More 

specifically, are there alternatives to 

certain elements of the means of 

defining eligible unserved areas that 

would be preferable? 


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In the Alaska Plan Order, the 

Commission reallocated funds for use in 

an auction for support to unserved 

areas. By December 31, 2026 that 

allocation will amount to approximately 

$162 million. The Commission seeks 

comment on whether this amount 

should be the maximum amount of 

support that can be assigned in the 

reverse auction. The reverse auction 

format that the Commission sets forth 

would assign support so as to maximize 

the additional coverage that can be 

supported with the budget. The 

Commission seeks comment on whether 

this amount will achieve the intended 

purpose. If commenters contend that 

additional support is needed, the 

Commission seeks comment on that 

amount and if there is support going to 

mobile wireless in Alaska that can be 

reallocated for unserved areas. 

In the Alaska Plan Order, the 

Commission stated that the reverse 

auction will be subject to the 

competitive bidding rules codified at 

Part 1 Subpart AA of the Commission’s 

rules. Consistent with this, under the 

competitive bidding approach, the 

Commission would use a multi-round, 

descending clock (reverse) auction to 

identify the areas that would receive 

support, the providers that would 

receive support and the amount of 

support that each winning bidder would 

be eligible to receive. The descending 

clock auction would consist of 

sequential bidding rounds according to 

an announced schedule providing the 

start time and closing time of each 

bidding round. The Commission would 

use a reverse auction format similar to 

that used for the Rural Digital 

Opportunity Fund and the Connect 

America Fund Phase II auctions. 

Bidding and Support Metric. Under 

this approach, bids in the reverse 

auction would be accepted and winning 

bids would be determined based on a 

price per eligible hex-9. Accordingly, 

the price clock would be denominated 

in terms of dollars per eligible hex-9. 

Each biddable area would be associated 

with a number of eligible hex-9s, and 

support amounts would be determined 

by multiplying the number of eligible 

hex-9s in the area by the relevant price 

per hex-9. The opening clock price 

times the number of eligible hex-9s in 

a biddable area would indicate the 

highest support amount that a bidder 

could receive for the area. The same 

clock price would apply to all eligible 

areas. 

The Commission also seeks comment 

on whether an alternative bidding and 

support metric, such as the number of 

BSLs in the eligible hex-9s in the 

biddable area, would be preferable to 

using the number of eligible hex-9s in 

the area. Under this approach, the 

Commission would use the number of 

hex-9s because hex-9s are a standard 

unit of area coverage (equal to .105 

square kilometers) and are small enough 

to enable a granular evaluation of 

whether there are locations—indications 

that mobile coverage would be used—in 

the area. Moreover, using the number of 

hex-9s in a biddable area as a metric is 

consistent with the approach the 

Commission adopts in this document 

for ACF Mobile Phase I and also seeks 

comment on for other elements of the 

ACF. 

Accepting Bids and Identifying 

Winning Bids. In the initial round of the 

auction mechanism, each bidder would 

indicate the biddable areas to which it 

is willing to provide service meeting the 

specified performance requirements in 

exchange for a support amount implied 

by the opening clock price. In each 

subsequent bidding round, the price 

clock would be decremented and each 

bidder would indicate the areas to 

which it is willing to provide service at 

the lower implied support amount. 

Under this reverse auction 

mechanism on which the Commission 

seeks comment, after every bidding 

round, the bidding system would 

calculate the total requested implied 

support for the areas that have bids at 

the current clock price (counting each 

area with a bid only once). If this 

amount is greater than the budget, then 

the price clock would be decremented 

again, and another bidding round would 

follow. After the first bidding round in 

which the total requested support is 

equal to or less than the budget—that is, 

the budget ‘‘clearing round’’—the 

bidding system would begin to assign 

support using a ‘‘second-price rule.’’ A 

second-price rule would ensure that 

each winning bidder receives a support 

amount for an area that is at least as 

great as the support amount implied by 

its bid price. Bidding would continue 

with a new bidding round at a 

decremented clock price for areas that 

receive more than one bid at the clock 

price in the clearing round, since at 

least two bidders are still competing for 

support to that area. Such rounds would 

continue until, for each such area, there 

is at most one bid at the clock price. The 

lowest bid for the area would be the 

winning bid, and support amounts again 

would be determined using a secondprice rule. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

this general approach to a multipleround, descending clock auction to 

assign support to areas in Alaska that 

are currently deemed unserved. If the 

Commission moves forward with this 

approach, as is the typical procedure for 

Commission auctions, it would delegate 

authority to WTB and the Office of 

Economics and Analytics to release a 

further Public Notice specifying in more 

detail the proposed rules and 

procedures of an auction mechanism 

that follows the general format the 

Commission sets forth here. At that 

point, the Commission would seek 

comment on the specific elements of the 

reverse auction. After taking into 

account the submitted comments, the 

Commission would release another 

Public Notice that lays out the specific 

rules and procedures to be used in the 

auction and announces the availability 

of bidder education materials. 

The Commission notes that the 

reverse auction could establish a level of 

support for unserved eligible areas 

through competition among bidders 

based on their assessment of the costs to 

deploy mobile service in these areas. 

Could the results of this reverse auction 

to assign support to unserved areas in 

Alaska help the Commission consider a 

more appropriate level of support for 

participants already serving existing 

areas in Alaska (single support areas or 

duplicative support areas), given that 

this support was initially established 

based on frozen costs of wireline 

deployment? 

Noncompetitive Alternative. Is there a 

reason to deviate from this reverse 

auction approach? Are there 

considerations that would argue in favor 

of another approach, and if so, what are 

they and how would they affect the 

determinations of eligible areas? 

Retail Consumer Subscribership. In 

the Alaska Plan, the Commission has 

found instances where some mobile 

provider participants had very few 

customers, and in one example, a 

provider claimed to have only one 

mobile data subscriber. In such 

instances, the Commission is concerned 

that it has been providing support in 

areas where subscribers are not 

subscribing to the services. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

whether it should require that all ACF 

mobile providers receiving support 

must have a minimum of five mobile 

data subscribers per census designated 

place and be able to provide proof of 

those subscribers upon request by WTB, 

starting with the due date of the first 

milestone. For this purpose, each 

subscriber would be one person, not 

directly employed by the provider, 

paying the publicly advertised rate for 

the mobile data service. Providers 

unable to provide address-level data of 

these subscribers upon demand after 

December 31, 2029, may have a 

proportional amount of support 


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withheld as not having effective service 

in the area. Providers may not take more 

than 14 days to satisfy any 

subscribership requests by WTB. Census 

designated places with fewer than 20 

people, based on most recent census 

estimates, are exempt from this 

requirement. The Commission seeks 

comment on this proposal. Would this 

approach help guard against waste, 

fraud, and abuse in the mobile portion 

of the ACF? Would, and if so, how 

would this approach materially affect 

the goal to ensure that mobile providers 

are covering where Alaskans travel? 

How much of the census designated 

place would need to be covered before 

such a condition would be applicable? 

In the Alaska Connect Fund Notice, 

the Commission sought comment on 

whether it should use the ACF to 

encourage the deployment of Open RAN 

in mobile networks, and if so how. The 

Commission has previously noted that 

networks deploying Open RAN ‘‘have 

the potential to address national 

security and other concerns that the 

Commission and other federal 

stakeholders have raised in recent years 

about network integrity and supply 

chain reliability.’’ In its comments, 

Alaska Telecom Association, the only 

commenter on this issue, argued that the 

Commission should avoid any mandates 

and that providers should have 

flexibility in deploying such network 

technologies in Alaska. The 

Commission has since concluded that it 

is in the public interest and serves 

national priorities to use universal 

service funds to incentivize the 

voluntary inclusion of Open RAN in 

mobile networks deployed with 5G 

Fund support. In the 5G Fund Second 

Report and Order, the Commission, 

recognizing the significant public 

interest benefits of Open RAN networks, 

and to encourage the voluntary 

inclusion of Open RAN in networks that 

are deployed with 5G Fund support, 

offered 5G Fund support recipients 

additional support and an extension of 

time to deploy networks with Open 

RAN technologies. The Commission 

seeks comment on whether it should 

consider similar incentives for ACF 

recipients deploying 5G networks. 

Based on what the Commission adopted 

in the concurrently adopted Order for 

single-support areas and duplicatesupport areas under ACF Mobile Phase 

I and are proposing to adopt for ACF 

Mobile Phase II, should the Commission 

adopt similar incentives to provide 

additional funding and extension of 

build-out obligations for providers that 

voluntarily agree to deploy Open RAN 

in Alaska for all ACF mobile provider 

recipients? 

In this document, the Commission 

seeks comment on whether ACF 

providers of mobile or fixed service 

must obtain the consent of the relevant 

Tribal government(s) for new 

deployments, prior to being authorized 

to receive support for those areas. The 

Tribal consent requirement is 

exclusively predicated on a governmentto-government relationship, based on 

the Tribes recognized from the Tribe Act 

of 1994. To promote and support Tribal 

sovereignty and self-determination, the 

Commission tentatively concludes that 

adopting a Tribal consent requirement 

in ACF rules is consistent with its longstanding recognition that engagement 

between Tribal governments and 

communications providers, and the 

Commission recognizes particularly that 

early engagement is an important 

element to promote the successful 

deployment and provision of service on 

Tribal lands. The Commission seeks 

comment generally on this tentative 

conclusion and how it may be 

implemented. 

In the Alaska Connect Fund Notice, 

the Commission reiterated its 

commitment to working with Tribes and 

Tribal leaders, and sought comment on 

considerations with respect to 

participation in the ACF by Indian 

Tribes, Tribal governments, and 

residents on Tribal lands. In recognition 

of the fact that engagement between 

Tribal nations and service providers ‘‘is 

vitally important to the successful 

deployment and provision of service,’’ 

the Commission has reaffirmed the 

importance of its obligation that all 

high-cost recipients serving Tribal lands 

demonstrate annually that they have 

meaningfully engaged with Tribal 

governments in their supported areas. 

Several commenters support additional 

Tribal consultation and Tribal 

engagement, and others argue the 

Commission should require Alaska 

high-cost recipients to obtain written 

authorizing resolutions from a Tribal 

government or Tribal entity under the 

Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 

1971 (ANCSA) prior to receiving 

support for projects proposed to be built 

on Tribal lands. 

In the recent 5G Fund Second Report 

and Order and Second Further Notice, 

89 FR 76016, September 17, 2024, the 

Commission explored the idea of 

requiring a winning bidder in the 5G 

Fund Phase I auction to demonstrate 

during the long-form application 

process, and prior to being authorized to 

receive support, that it has obtained the 

consent of the relevant Tribal 

government(s) for any necessary access 

to deploy network facilities using its 5G 

Fund support on Tribal lands within the 

area(s) of its winning bid(s). The 

Commission tentatively concluded that 

adopting a Tribal consent requirement 

in its 5G Fund rules is consistent with 

its long-standing recognition that 

engagement between Tribal 

governments and communications 

providers, particularly early 

engagement, is an important element to 

promote the successful deployment and 

provision of service on Tribal lands. The 

Commission envisioned a Tribal 

consent requirement for the 5G Fund as 

a continuation of its commitment to 

ensuring Tribal engagement by service 

providers that receive high-cost 

universal service support and in 

furtherance of the Commission’s Policy 

Statement establishing a government-togovernment relationship with Tribes. 

Additionally, in the 5G Fund Second 

Report and Order and Second Further 

Notice, the Commission looked to the 

Tribal consent requirements of its Tribal 

Lands Bidding Credit (TLBC) as a guide 

and discussed including a requirement 

that applicants for 5G Fund support to 

provide service on Tribal lands submit 

a certification from the Tribal 

government(s) that it has granted any 

required consent. 

The Commission tentatively 

concludes that it should require Tribal 

consent for deployment of new facilities 

for mobile providers participating in the 

ACF and any new deployments that 

may be authorized under Fixed ACFs 

and seeks comment on how it could 

implement this requirement. The 

Commission seeks comment on what it 

should consider as deployment of new 

facilities for Tribal consent purposes. 

Should the Commission use any of the 

existing high-cost universal service 

Tribal engagement requirements to 

develop the criteria necessary to 

evidence Tribal consent in order to 

provide more consistency and 

predictability for both Tribal 

governments and service providers? The 

Commission seeks comment on any 

other consent requirements that will 

help provide equitable provision of ACF 

support for mobile and fixed broadband 

service using new facilities located on 

Tribal lands and that would benefit 

Tribal communities in Alaska. 

In the Alaska Connect Fund Report 

and Order, 89 FR 25147, April 10, 2024, 

supra, the Commission reminded 

recipients of high-cost support serving 

Tribal Lands that they are required to 

have annual discussions with Tribal 

governments that include feasibility and 

sustainability planning and compliance 

with applicable Tribal requirements. 

The Commission seeks comment on 


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whether it should consider additional or 

different Tribal engagement 

requirements under § 54.313(a)(5) of the 

Commission’s rules for ACF fixed and 

mobile support recipients. 

The Commission seeks comment on 

how compliance with a Tribal consent 

requirement may be demonstrated and 

verified by the Commission. In the 5G 

Fund Second Report Order and Second 

Further Notice, the Commission also 

sought comment on whether it should 

include parameters similar to the those 

that the Commission includes for a 

winning bidder that is applying for a 

TLBC to demonstrate its compliance 

with any Tribal consent requirement, 

including a requirement for submission 

of a certification from the Tribal 

government(s) that it has granted any 

required Tribal consent. Such a required 

certification of Tribal consent could 

include: the signature of an official of 

the Tribal Government and their title; a 

statement that the Tribal government 

has not and will not enter into an 

exclusive contract with the applicant to 

preclude entry by other carriers and will 

not unreasonably discriminate among 

wireless carriers seeking to provide 

service on the eligible Tribal land; and 

a statement that the Tribal government 

will, as applicable, permit the applicant 

to locate and deploy facilities on the 

Tribal land consistent with ACF public 

interest obligations and performance 

requirements. Would using the TLBC 

certification model adequately reflect 

the contours of Tribal government 

consent in this context? Under this 

model, once the certifications from the 

applicant and the consent of the Tribal 

government(s) being served are received 

and reviewed by the Commission and 

determined to be consistent with the 

ACF rules, support may be authorized. 

What adjustments to this model should 

be made if it is used? Should a process 

such as the TLBC certification process 

be adopted? The Commission seeks 

comment on how it might be able to 

incorporate flexibility in such a process. 

If the Commission does adopt a Tribal 

consent requirement, when should that 

consent be obtained for the purposes of 

the ACF? How would the Commission’s 

requirement be impacted by the 

Broadband Equity Access and 

Deployment (BEAD) requirement? 

Would the Commission need to adopt a 

specific Tribal consent dispute 

resolution process? How could the 

Commission assist in the Tribal consent 

dispute resolution process? Did any 

issues arise with respect to Tribal 

engagement or access to Tribal lands for 

deployments during the course of the 

Alaska Plan that can be improved upon? 

Given Tribal sovereignty, how should 

the Commission address circumstances 

in which a Tribal government neither 

declines nor provides consent? What are 

the costs and burdens of such 

requirements to providers? Should 

different requirements be made for 

mobile support in Alaska versus fixed 

support? 

In terms of who must provide 

consent, the Commission recognizes 

that the question of Tribal land 

management and sovereignty in Alaska 

is unique in many respects. All of 

Alaska is considered Tribal land for 

purposes of the universal service fund 

programs. Unlike the lower 48 states, 

Alaska’s Tribal lands are not held and 

managed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs 

(BIA). Rather, its Tribal lands are held 

and managed by Alaska Native Regional 

Corporations. Twelve years after Alaska 

was granted statehood in 1959, the 

ANCSA was passed into law. ANCSA 

sought to address the ‘‘immediate need 

for a fair and just settlement of all 

claims by Natives and Native groups of 

Alaska.’’ ANCSA did this by 

extinguishing all ‘‘aboriginal titles’’ and 

divided Alaska into twelve distinct 

regions and for-profit corporations. Each 

Native Alaskan was enrolled in one of 

the corporations; enrollment was 

determined in a tiered manner using the 

Native’s region of residency as of 1970, 

region of birth, or region of ancestor 

birth; and through this enrollment the 

Native Alaskan was listed as a 

shareholder of a corporation. In other 

words, much of the land claims of the 

Alaska Native Villages are managed by 

the for-profit Alaska corporations, 

whose shareholders are often comprised 

by many different federally recognized 

Tribes. Deployment of advanced 

communications services provided by 

the ACF will cross and cover these 

lands, as they did in the Alaska Plan. 

Given these unique aspects of Tribal 

land management in Alaska, the 

Commission tentatively concludes that 

an ACF recipient seeking to deploy new 

facilities on Tribal lands must obtain 

consent from the appropriate Tribal 

entity. Is the appropriate Tribal entity 

the relevant Alaska Native Village(s) 

recognized by the BIA? The Commission 

notes that federally recognized Tribes 

have a government-to-government 

relationship with the United States and 

are eligible to receive certain 

protections, services, and benefits by 

virtue of their federally recognized 

status. While the Commission’s rules 

with respect to Tribal eligibility in 

various contexts vary somewhat, they 

universally limit eligibility to those 

Tribes that are ‘‘federally-recognized.’’ 

The Commission also seeks comment 

regarding the role of the Alaska Native 

Corporations as they relate to Tribal 

consent requirements of it. 

In addition, the Commission seeks 

comment on how to address the fact that 

many Alaska Native Villages do not 

have defined boundaries but are 

assigned into Alaska Native Village 

Statistical Areas (ANVSA) by the 

Census Bureau, and that much of Alaska 

lies outside these areas, which opens 

the possibility to multiple claims of 

sovereignty. In § 54.5, the Commission 

defines Tribal lands for the purposes of 

the high-cost support as including 

‘‘Alaska Native regions established 

pursuant to the Alaska Native Claims 

Settlement Act (85 Stat. 688).’’ However, 

Alaska Native regions often contain 

many different Tribal entities, and given 

the size of the Alaska Native regions, 

several of the Tribal entities in the 

respective Alaska Native region may not 

be physically located near the 

deployment in a region. Should the 

Tribal consent process be limited to new 

deployments or buildouts where the 

facilities placement occurs within the 

census boundaries of an ANVSA, as this 

situation would clearly identify that a 

particular Tribal entity is directly 

affected by a deployment? The 

Commission seeks comment generally 

on these issues. 

The Commission, as part of its 

continuing effort to advance digital 

equity for all, including people of color, 

persons with disabilities, persons who 

live in rural or Tribal areas, and others 

who are or have been historically 

underserved, marginalized, or adversely 

affected by persistent poverty or 

inequality, invites comment on any 

equity-related considerations, and 

invites comment on any benefits (if any) 

that may be associated with the 

proposals and issues discussed herein. 

Specifically, the Commission seeks 

comment on how its proposals may 

promote or inhibit advances in 

diversity, equity, inclusion, and 

accessibility, as well as the scope of the 

Commission’s relevant legal authority. 

II. Procedural Matters 

Paperwork Reduction Act 

The FNPRM contains possible new or 

modified information collection 

requirements. The Commission, as part 

of its continuing effort to reduce 

paperwork burdens, will invite the 

general public and the Office of 

Management and Budget to comment on 

the information collection requirements 

contained in this document, as required 

by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 

1995, Public Law 104–13. In addition, 

pursuant to the Small Business 

Paperwork Relief Act of 2002, Public 


ddrumheller on DSK120RN23PROD with PROPOSALS1
96176 Federal Register / Vol. 89, No. 233 / Wednesday, December 4, 2024 / Proposed Rules 

Law 107–198, see 44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(4), 

the Commission seeks specific comment 

on how it might further reduce the 

information collection burden for small 

business concerns with fewer than 25 

employees. 

As required by the Regulatory 

Flexibility Act of 1980, as amended 

(RFA), the Commission has prepared 

this Initial Regulatory Flexibility 

Analysis (IRFA) of the possible 

significant economic impact on a 

substantial number of small entities by 

the policies in this document. Written 

public comments are requested on this 

IRFA. Comments must be identified as 

responses to the IRFA and must be filed 

by the deadlines for comments provided 

in this document. The Commission will 

send a copy of the FNPRM, including 

this IRFA, to the Chief Counsel for 

Advocacy of the Small Business 

Administration. 

In the FNPRM, the Commission seeks 

comment on several issues pertaining to 

the implementation of the ACF. In doing 

so, the Commission continues to work 

towards its objectives of providing 

service to rural and high-cost areas of 

Alaska, which historically are some of 

the most difficult and costliest areas to 

serve in the country and where many 

residents continue to lack access to the 

high-quality, affordable broadband 

service enjoyed by other parts of our 

nation. Specifically, the Commission 

seeks comment on ACF Mobile Phase II 

service goals or requirements, as well as 

on a methodology to determine a single 

support amount for areas where more 

than one provider had been receiving 

support for overlapping service areas, as 

well as for use in determining support 

amounts for areas that the Commission 

deems ineligible in the concurrently 

adopted Order. Additionally, the 

Commission seeks comment on how to 

resolve duplicative funding so that only 

one provider would continue receiving 

support in the area, in particular 

proposing two possible mechanisms to 

address this issue. Further comment is 

also sought to update the record on how 

best to deploy service to unserved areas 

using the approximately $162 million 

collected from the Alaska Plan. Finally, 

the Commission seeks comment on 

additional issues, such as retail 

consumer conditions, Open RAN, and 

Tribal consent under the ACF. In further 

developing the record in this 

proceeding, the Commission relies on 

the experiences of carriers with 

operations in Alaska, many of which are 

small business entities, to build a record 

on how best to implement the ACF. 

The proposed action is authorized 

pursuant to sections 4(i), 214, 254, 

303(r), and 403 of the Communications 

Act of 1934, as amended, 47 U.S.C. 

154(i), 201, 205, 214, 254, 303(r), 403, 

and §§ 1.1 and 1.421 of the 

Commission’s rules, 47 CFR 1.1, 1.421. 

Small entities potentially affected by 

the rules herein include Wired 

Telecommunications Carriers, LECs, 

Incumbent LECs, Competitive LECs, 

Interexchange Carriers (IXC’s), Local 

Resellers, Toll Resellers, Other Toll 

Carriers, Prepaid Calling Card Providers, 

Fixed Microwave Services, Cable and 

Other Subscription Programming, Cable 

Companies and Systems (Rate 

Regulation), Cable System Operators 

(Telecom Act Standard), Radio and 

Television Broadcasting and Wireless 

Communications Equipment 

Manufacturing, Satellite 

Telecommunications, Wireless 

Telecommunications Carriers (except 

Satellite), All Other 

Telecommunications, Wired Broadband 

internet Access Service Providers 

(Wired ISPs), Wireless Broadband 

internet Access Service Providers 

(Wireless ISPs or WISPs), internet 

Service Providers (Non-Broadband), and 

All Other Information Services. 

Potential rules resulting from 

comments in the FNPRM, could impose 

new or additional recordkeeping and 

reporting requirements for small and 

other entities, if adopted. Specifically, 

in the FNPRM, the Commission seeks 

comment on a number of issues related 

to the implementation of the ACF. For 

example, the FNPRM seeks comment on 

setting a minimum goal of deployment 

of 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps for all mobile 

providers participating in ACF Mobile 

Phase II, as well as whether any 

exemptions should be made for certain 

areas. Under the competitive 

mechanism, providers seeking to 

participate would submit proposals 

including coverage maps for the areas 

where more than one provider currently 

receives support, as well as the 

surrounding community where no 

provider or only a single provider may 

currently offer service. The coverage 

map would comply with BDC mobile 

coverage data requirements and would 

predict 5G–NR coverage in an outdoor 

stationary environment. An ETC may 

propose to cover a tract with 5G–NR 

7/1 Mbps service or 5G–NR 35/3 Mbps 

service, but separate coverage maps 

must be submitted for each proposed 

service. For the alternative mechanism, 

the Commission seeks comment on 

whether to set a minimum goal of 

deployment for support under ACF 

Mobile Phase II of 5G–NR 7/1 Mbps 

measured in an outdoor stationary 

environment. 

The RFA requires an agency to 

describe any significant alternatives that 

could minimize impacts to small 

entities that it has considered in 

reaching its proposed approach, which 

may include the following four 

alternatives (among others): ‘‘(1) the 

establishment of differing compliance or 

reporting requirements or timetables 

that take into account the resources 

available to small entities; (2) the 

clarification, consolidation, or 

simplification of compliance and 

reporting requirements under the rule 

for such small entities; (3) the use of 

performance rather than design 

standards; and (4) an exemption from 

coverage of the rule, or any part thereof, 

for such small entities.’’ 

The FNPRM also takes the step of 

outlining an alternative mechanism that 

would allow a provider to retain its 

funding if it provides comparable 

service in a nonduplicate-support area, 

as well as consider alternative 

approaches from small and other 

entities on how best to achieve an 

outcome that dovetails both the 

Commission’s policy goals and the 

minimization of substantial economic 

impact to small entities. 

III. Ordering Clauses 

It is further ordered that, pursuant to 

the authority contained in sections 4(i), 

201, 205, 214, 254, 303(r), and 403 of 

the Communications Act of 1934, as 

amended, 47 U.S.C. 154(i), 201, 205, 

214, 254, 303(r), 403, and §§ 1.1 and 

1.421 of the Commission’s rules, 47 CFR 

1.1, 1.421, the FNPRM is adopted. The 

FNPRM will be effective upon 

publication in the Federal Register, 

with comment dates indicated therein. 

Federal Communications Commission. 

Marlene Dortch, 

Secretary, Office of the Secretary. 

[FR Doc. 2024–28170 Filed 12–3–24; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 6712–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION 

Federal Motor Carrier Safety 

Administration 

49 CFR Part 383 

[Docket No. FMCSA–2024–0121] 

RIN 2126–AC59 

Transportation of Fuel for Agricultural 

Aircraft Operations 

AGENCY: Federal Motor Carrier Safety 

Administration (FMCSA), Department 

of Transportation (DOT). 

ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking 

(NPRM). 


ddrumheller on DSK120RN23PROD with PROPOSALS1