Eroding E-rate
Fraud threatens Internet program for U.S. schools
Posted on 03/21/2005 7:28:13 PM PST by glorgau
Don't get too excited yet, but there's a chance your monthly telephone bill will get a few dollars cheaper.
Some members of Congress have begun speculating whether a government entitlement program riddled with waste and corruption and funded by taxes on telecommunications companies should be terminated. If the so-called E-rate program ended, the average phone bill would drop by $10 or more a year, an annual total of $2.25 billion.
Rep. Joe Barton, chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, suggested at a hearing last week that the E-rate program had become a billion-dollar boondoggle. "This committee has no choice but to develop legislation to scrap the status quo and apply some common sense to the E-rate program," the Texas Republican said.
E-rate was created in 1996 to wire schools and libraries to the Internet by providing discounts of up to 90 percent on approved products and services. Since then, E-rate administrators have vacuumed in $14.6 billion in telecommunications taxes but have, inexplicably, handed out only $9.2 billion.
A recent Government Accountability Office report exposes the Federal Communications Commission's slipshod management of the E-rate program. Among the GAO's findings: There's no way to tell whether E-rate is working or worth keeping around, its current setup likely violates federal law, and nobody seems to be in charge.
"FCC established an unusual structure for the E-rate program but has never conducted a comprehensive assessment of which federal requirements, policies and practices apply," the report concluded. No wonder one E-rate "provider" pleaded guilty last year to bid rigging and wire fraud, and agreed to pay $20 million in restitution.
If E-rate were run by a private firm that had to follow standard accounting rules, this scheme would have been toast long ago.
But this is Washington, D.C., where the mere act of questioning an entitlement program counts as political doughtiness of the first order. Barton deserves credit for being courageous enough to raise the possibility of rethinking E-rate, which has been a third rail of technology policy for nearly a decade.
"The mismanagement of the E-rate program seems to know few bounds," Barton said. "Unscrupulous vendors have fleeced the program, while underserved communities and telephone customers are paying the price. The FCC, these merchants and certain schools all must share the blame for this disgrace."
This is shaping up to be a partisan divide. At last week's hearing, Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., suggested that he might be open to modest reforms such as moving E-rate away from the FCC and to another agency. More partisan Democrats, including Michigan's John Dingell and Bart Stupak, seem opposed to any changes.
A taxing reform process
A decade ago, when Internet connections were rare and expensive, there was some justification for a national effort to link up schools and libraries.
Today, though, broadband connections are plentiful and inexpensive: More than 94.3 percent of U.S. ZIP codes had high-speed lines available through one or more providers as of last year. In 2002, according to the Department of Education's estimates, 99 percent of public
Continued ...
I have a feeling the traditional land lines will be going away slowly
You mean Joe Barton is really going todo something for that fat pay check.
KevinDavis wrote:
I have a feeling the traditional land lines will be going away slowly
--> I have a landline that is "Mothballed"
I have it but rarely use it, since my cell is so handy.
I do keep it around though just in case, because it feels like yes, landlines are so ancient now but everyone seems to forget, What happens when all the Cell sites go down someday? We never know, but i always like to have some way to communicate, whether is is Ham, DSL, Cells, mirrors or smoke signals :)
Wonder how they figure that? I'm one of the 5.7 percent that doesn't have high speed/broadband internet.
Slowly, perhaps. Cellphones have been useless here since they were invented.
As I recall the E-rate was imposed by Agore to wire all the schools for the internet he invented.
It looks like a creative attempt to mislead.
Access does not mean you actually have it, it means you could have it.
They're also using zip codes, and if a person or a few can get it in that zip code, but not everybody, that zip counts as having access to it.
Pretty slick.
Exactly. That numer will also never reach 100% because a certain percentage of the phone lines in this country are too far and remote for even ADSL.
All the schools here were wired under E-Rate back in 1996. They have their own T-1 connection and each have one server.
when you say phone....you mean land line or cell? There are more insane "taxes" on cell bills than regualar land line bills
You still have Dialup?! It's the 21st century! I thought Dialup was a thing of the past, gone away with the likes horse-drawn carriages and phonographs!
I would prefer that the Rats get plenty of credit for this fiasco.
You're 18 years old, right?
It's actually cheaper for me to use a cell phone in these parts, and I'm not 18.
Yep. Cable modems access isn't made available here, and I'm 20 miles beyond the "last mile" for ADSL. I assume you've never been to rural America.
That came out wrong - ignore.
I have dial-up as well. Mine is pretty fast and only cost 10.95 a month. The federal tax on telephone bills goes back to WW11 and was supposed to be removed as soon as the war was paid for. HA HA HA I pay 6.50 for the FCC Network Acces tax.
What planet you from again?
Government takes $$$ from workin' folks; and puts computers
and fibre-optic internet in the "Poor inter-city schools"
The Phone Co. and the Cable people, have to make $$$ to stay in business.
Some markets just don't tempt some "Capitalists".
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