Arkansas Administrative Code › Agency 003 - DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE › Division 19 - Arkansas Economic Development Commission › Rule 003.19.21-006 - Arkansas Rural Connect Broadband Grant Program Emergency Rule

Current through Register Vol. 49, No. 6, June, 2024
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Purpose and emergency need
The Arkansas Economic Development Commission and the Arkansas
				Broadband Office have promulgated an emergency rule that amended the Arkansas
				Rural Connect Broadband Grant Program (ARC). The purpose of the rule is to
				revise the procedure for disbursing ARC funds so that grant recipients will
				receive grant funds in quarterly installments based on expenses incurred and
				submitted to the Arkansas Broadband Office and verified by UAMS.
AEDC and the Arkansas Broadband Office have determined that an
				emergency rule is necessary to continue to disburse funds to rural areas of
				Arkansas for the deployment of broadband infrastructure. Broadband is a
				critical tool for Arkansans to access telemedicine, distance learning, and
				telework.
Key points
* The emergency rule allows the Arkansas Broadband Office to
				award grant funds to recipients in quarterly installments. This reverts the
				disbursement process to what it was at the inception of the ARC program and
				before the CARES Act.
* There are no upfront payments.
* These installments will be based on expenses incurred by the
				grantees and submitted to the Arkansas Broadband Office for reimbursement after
				review and verification by UAMS.
* The Arkansas Broadband Office will promulgate a permanent
				rule through the Administrative Procedures Act.
Effective date
The emergency rule is effective on November 19, 2021.
ARKANSAS RURAL CONNECT BROADBAND GRANT
				PROGRAM
Emergency Rule
Section
			 1.
Purpose
The purpose of this proposed Rule is to help implement polices
				advanced in the "Arkansas State Broadband Plan," (hereafter, the "Broadband
				Plan Report") as issued by the Office of Arkansas Governor, Asa Hutchinson, on
				May 15, 2019. The proposed rule is intended to establish requirements for
				governmental entities to participate in the Arkansas Rural Connect Broadband
				Grant Program (hereafter, "ARC," or the "ARC Program") in order to provide or
				expand broadband services consistent with the Broadband Plan Report, resulting
				in increased educational opportunities, healthcare opportunities, and economic
				development opportunities and ensuring all Arkansans have equal access to the
				services they can use to improve their quality of life, their community, and
				this State.
Section 2.
Introduction
As broadband access becomes more necessary to normal modern
				life, there is growing concern about a digital divide, whereby some areas are
				cut off from opportunities for economic development by a lack of adequate
				broadband service. To help close that digital divide, the ARC Program is being
				instituted to help communities incentivize providers to deploy adequate
				broadband service to their residents. The program will provide funds to
				internet service providers (ISPs) to serve target municipalities at the request
				of those municipalities. ARC funds will be allocated on a competitive and
				transparent basis, with efforts made to maximize the impact of scarce state
				funds.
Section 3.
Authority
This proposed Rule is issued by the Director of the Arkansas
				Economic Development Commission ("AEDC") under Ark. Code Ann. §
									15-4-209(b)
				(5) which provides that AEDC may promulgate
				rules necessary to implement the programs and services offered by AEDC. On or
				about August 9, 2019, Governor Asa Hutchinson authorized a transfer of funding
				for the implementation and administration of the ARC Program to AEDC. Pursuant
				to Ark. Code Ann. §
									15-4-209(a)(1),
				AEDC is authorized to administer grants to assist with the economic development
				in the State. The ARC Program is therefore authorized to administer the ARC
				grant and authorized to establish administrative rules under Ark. Code Ann.
				§
									15-4-209(b)
				(5) as a service offered by AEDC.
Section 4.
Definitions
(1) "25/3" means
			 minimum speed 25 Mbps download/3 Mbps upload.
(2) "AEDC" means the Arkansas Economic
			 Development Commission.
(3) "ARC"
			 means Arkansas Rural Connect.
(4)
			 "ASBO" means Arkansas State Broadband Office.
(5) "Available" means, in the case of
			 broadband service, that a provider stands ready to provide broadband service to
			 a location within thirty (30) days of a request for service being
			 made
(6) "Broadband" means, for
			 purposes of these rules, an internet connection by fiber optic cable, coaxial
			 copper wire, DSL, or fixed wireless with at least 25/3 speeds, latency less
			 than 100 ms, and no data usage caps or throttling below 150 Gb per
			 month
(7) "Community" means a
			 municipality, unincorporated community, or county
(8) "ESRI Shapefile" means a geospatial
			 vector data format that can be utilized by ESRI or other GIS software
(9) "Interdependent projects" means projects
			 which are part of a set of projects involving the same ISP, each of which the
			 ISP commits to implement only if all of the projects in the set get funded, and
			 will be assumed for purposes of project selection to be less desirable to
			 implement if some of the projects in the set are not funded. This may occur,
			 for example, if deployment involves creating shared assets that need to recover
			 costs from multiple projects to be economically justifiable. The ASBO will take
			 note of the interdependent nature of the projects, and avoid approving any
			 interdependent project if the other projects in the interdependent set are not
			 also funded.
(10) "ISP" means
			 Internet Service Provider, its successors or assigns
(11) "Location" means any structure that is
			 legally fit for occupancy as a commercial or residential dwelling.
(12) "Mbps" means megabits per
			 second
(13) "Municipality" means a
			 legally incorporated municipality under Arkansas law
(14) "Project cost" is the entire capital
			 cost of a broadband project
(15)
			 "Project footprint" is the geographic territory within which a project will
			 provide broadband coverage
(16)
			 "Project organizers" means public officials, ISPs, civic groups, or anyone else
			 who takes a leading role in developing an Arkansas Rural Connect broadband
			 project. While projects may be catalyzed, initiated, organized and developed,
			 in principle, by anyone, the set of people who can actually submit applications
			 for Arkansas Rural Connect grants is more limited, as explained in Section
			 7.
(17) "RFA" means Request for
			 Applications
(18) "State grant" is
			 the amount of money that grant applicants request from Arkansas Rural Connect
			 in order to close the business case for a project, and which they will receive
			 from the State if their project is approved and deployment proceeds as
			 anticipated.
(19) "Unincorporated
			 community" means a population center with historic boundaries that are
			 understood in local custom and amenable to mapping, but which is not legally
			 incorporated as a municipality. Census-Designated Places recognized by the
			 United States Census Bureau are automatically recognized as unincorporated
			 communities, while other unincorporated communities' status and boundaries must
			 be established by maps and narratives, as explained in 6.H.1.
(20) "Unserved" means that a location lacks
			 access to broadband service by fiber optic cable, coaxial copper wire, DSL, or
			 fixed wireless at any price.