The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is in charge of a $1 billion grant program to improve middle-mile broadband infrastructure, but a new Government Accountability Office (GAO) report reveals that the NTIA has not established measurable goals for the program.
Middle-mile infrastructure connects local networks with robust, high-capacity national and regional networks, ensuring reliable high-speed internet service for remote areas.
NTIA’s Enabling Middle Mile Broadband Infrastructure Program provides funding for this infrastructure, but GAO said the agency needs to establish “measurable goals with specific targets – which would allow NTIA to track the effectiveness of grant funding.”
The government watchdog said that NTIA did not follow performance management leading practices and Federal regulations, which call for quantifiable goals.
Additionally, GAO said “Federal regulations also require agencies issuing a notice of funding opportunity to develop program performance goals and measures during planning and design, and include this information in the funding notice.”
“GAO found NTIA had not developed such goals or measures prior to issuing its funding notice,” the report adds. “By not doing so, NTIA missed the opportunity to inform applicants on how they could contribute to the goals during its applicant review and selection process.”
Earlier this year, GAO reported that NTIA also did not develop performance goals for two other programs that are pumping out billions of dollars of broadband funding nationwide: the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program (TBCP) and the Broadband Infrastructure Program (BIP).
“By establishing performance measures with specified targets, NTIA can provide Congress with key information on program outcomes,” the GAO report says. “Moreover, by establishing a process to ensure that goals and measures are developed during a program’s planning stages NTIA can better target grant funding that links to desired outcomes.”
GAO made two recommendations for NTIA, including that it establish performance measures with specific targets for the middle-mile grant program. It also recommended that NTIA establish a process for developing performance goals and measures during program planning and design. NTIA agreed with both recommendations.
