WASHINGTON – A multibillion dollar, nationwide program aimed at ensuring affordable access to communications services in largely rural areas appears to suffer from inadequate oversight, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office. Released today, the report questions the Federal Communication Commission’s oversight of the Universal Service Fund’s High Cost program and finds that USF funding is distributed in a manner that may cause disparities in the availability of telecommunications services in different rural communities.
The GAO report was requested by Reps. John D. Dingell (D-MI) and Joe Barton (R-TX), the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and Reps. Bart Stupak (D-MI) and John Shimkus (R-IL), the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. The Members of Congress said the report highlights the need for a comprehensive review of the USF program.
“Universal service is a fundamentally American value: every consumer should have access to affordable communications, regardless of where they live,” said Dingell. “Proper management of the Universal Service Fund is critical and apparently has been sorely lacking.”
“I think both Republicans and Democrats recognize that the USF is dreadfully inefficient and that we can either do something about it or just keep wasting people’s money,” said Barton. “Personally, I’d be happy to abolish the fund and leave several billion dollars a year in the pockets of telephone users who earned it, but until that glorious day arrives, it seems reasonable to reform the offender if we can. GAO has some good ideas for whipping USF into shape, and I think that with some continued bipartisan effort, we can prod the FCC into adopting them.”
“The Universal Service Fund is vital to ensuring affordable telecommunications services are available in rural areas like northern Michigan, so it is disturbing to me that the GAO has found such weaknesses in how the FCC oversees the High Cost program,” said Stupak. “I look forward to working with my colleagues on the Energy and Commerce Committee to address the problems found with the High Cost program, so that it may more effectively support telecommunications services to rural America.”
GAO found that to strengthen management and oversight of the program, the FCC should establish short-term and long-term performance goals and measures. GAO also determined that the FCC should implement mechanisms to ensure that expenditures are cost-effective.
The Universal Service Fund is a federal program that ensures consumers have access to affordable telecommunications. The FCC oversees the Fund, which is made up of four programs: High Cost, Low Income, Schools and Libraries, and Rural Health Care. In 2007, the Fund provided nearly $7 billion of support for these programs, with more than half of the funding going to the High Cost program.
The full GAO report, entitled “The FCC Needs to Improve Performance Management and Strengthen Oversight of the High-Cost Program,” can be found here.
Last month, the Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet held a hearing on the future of the Universal Service Fund. For information on that hearing, visit:
http://energycommerce.house.gov/cmte_mtgs/110-ti-hrg.062408.UniversalService.shtml
