Dear NTIA/RUS: Why Not Let The Public Have Its Say?

So here's where things currently stand regarding the broadband stimulus as I see them:

- It's been eight months since the stimulus passed, and the only money to be awarded has been to four states for mapping.

- It's been roughly six months since the public had a chance to provide any input on this rulemaking, review, and approval process.

- It's been two months since applications were submitted, and we have no idea if anyone's reviewing anything, and we're a day away from states having to make their hurried recommendations.

What's next? Nobody knows. Presumably we're going to hear about some more mapping grants going out. Hopefully we're going to get to hear what projects states recommended. At some point incumbents get to have their say. And eventually decisions will be made on who gets what.

Also, before long the public should be asked to comment on how this whole review process has gone in order to help inform how the next round should be handled, despite the fact that the first round is a long way from being done.

In the meantime, the public and applicants are left waiting without any idea of what's going on or any way to help contribute to the process.

So here's my thought: why not let the public have its say on who should get what money?

The way to do this could be relatively simple and straightforward.

Once states have submitted their recommendations, hopefully NTIA and RUS will have at least completed an initial culling of all the applications that aren't up to snuff. By combining these two lists NTIA and RUS can put out their short lists of finalists.

At that point we put the finalists on a site where the public can vote for and comment on specific projects. We'll have to monitor the site closely to insure it's not abused, and ultimately the results of the site will just help inform the final decision-making rather than allowing the public to dictate agency actions.

But in doing this we can collect a lot of good feedback from the public about these projects: the good, the bad, and the ugly. We can also get a sense for how popular various projects are relative to others in their state and others like them across the country, and how committed local community officials are to seeing them succeed.

Not only would this provide some cover for the hard decisions NTIA and RUS have to make, but it would also give the public some way to contribute and feel better informed and more involved with this process. I think doing this would do a lot of good for settling some of the sense of unease among those of us who have been observing or participating in the process.

This public site could also be the forum in which NTIA and RUS asks followup questions of finalists. While there may be some questions that need to be asked privately, I think there are a lot that we could ask of all applicants and require that they answer on the public record. For example, I'd like everyone to answer: "What are your plans to make sure this project is sustainable? For networks, what accommodations do you have for reinvesting revenue in upgrading and expanding capacity? And how are you going to insure that prices stay low for customers in places where you're going to be a natural monopoly?"

There are a host of other questions I can think of that I'd like to pose to applicants publicly. In asking these questions we can get a better sense for how prepared, thoughtful, and committed an applicant is to serving a particular area.

While it will take some work and resources to build a site like this, maintain it, and make sure the results are usable for decisionmakers at NTIA and RUS, ultimately I think getting the public more involved will pay dividends, and a site like this could help make sure the best applicants are receiving funding.

On a related note, even with this site I wouldn't wait to announce all of the winners. In fact, from a PR point of view, I think the best thing to do would be to pick the top ten no-brainer applications that you know you want to fund and get them out there ASAP as winners. Then suggest that you need help making the other tough decisions out of a huge list of worthwhile finalists, and that's why you're enlisting the public's support.

By following this thread NTIA and RUS can transform this situation from a PR nightmare, where no one knows what's going on and the public's getting antsy about what's happening with their tax dollars behind closed doors, to a huge PR win, proving that these agencies are committed to engaging the public in new ways using technology.