AG Schmitt intervenes in broadband grant challenge in Southeast Missouri

Thousands of Southeast Missouri residents currently without high-speed internet service could benefit from a recent government ruling clearing the way for broadband infrastructure improvements throughout the region.

The ruling by the Federal Communications Commission came after the Missouri Attorney General’s Office sided with the a pair of internet providers who had applied for Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) grants but were being blocked from doing so by a third provider, which said it was already providing high-speed internet service in Southeast Missouri.

In April, BPS Networks in Bernie, Missouri, challenged approximately 2,200 census blocks in Southeast Missouri and Northeast Arkansas, which the FCC had deemed eligible for RDOF grant funding. Those census blocks encompassed approximately 6,000 square miles.

Had it been accepted by the FCC, BPS’s challenge would have prevented SEMO Electric Cooperative in Sikeston, Missouri, and the Pemiscot Dunklin Electric Cooperative in Bragg City, Missouri, from seeking RDOF funding.

It also could have resulted in the loss of tens of millions of dollars in subsidies for broadband development in rural Missouri and Arkansas, according to the Attorney General’s Office.

During a stop Wednesday in Cape Girardeau, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt said his office determined BPS had misrepresented its level of broadband service to the FCC.

“We did a little investigating on our own,” Schmitt said, “and we sent a letter to the FCC challenging (BPS’s claims), saying, ‘Look, these (grant) dollars will be very well spent in Southeast Missouri because there is really no broadband access to the standards the FCC considers viable in those areas.’ The FCC cited our letter as persuasive and overruled the BPS objection.”

The FCC’s rejection of BPS’s challenge “is a big deal, especially for folks in Southeast Missouri,” Schmitt said. “If that objection had held, those two co-ops in particular wouldn’t have been able to access grant funds.”

High-speed internet access, and specifically the lack of it, has been an issue in rural Missouri for a number of years.

“It’s been an issue for a while, but I think there’s definitely more of a focus on it now,” Schmitt said. “There’re funds available now and we want to make sure no part of the state is left behind, because, as this pandemic has shown everybody, it’s more critical now more than ever. We rely on access to the internet for almost everything in our daily lives, especially in these times. We’re realizing how reliant we really are on that connectivity and large swaths of rural Missouri have been separated from that.”

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