National Telecommunications and Information Administration Broadband Technology Opportunities Program Evaluation Study. Short-Term Economic Impacts Report.

摘要

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) appropriated $4.4 billion in federal funding to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to implement the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) in order to spur job creation, stimulate economic growth, and increase access to information.1 BTOP projects support increased broadband access and adoption, provide broadband training and support through community organizations, and stimulate the demand for broadband. NTIA distributed grant funding to 233 projects, benefiting all 50 states, 5 territories, and the District of Columbia. The types of projects BTOP funded include Public Computer Center (PCC) projects, Sustainable Broadband Adoption (SBA) projects, and Comprehensive Community Infrastructure (CCI) projects. Grantee budgets were composed of both federal funds and non-federal matching funds. NTIA allocated a total of 3.4 billion federal dollars to the BTOP grantees. In addition to these federal funds, grantees have a combined $1.2 billion in non-federal matching funding, for a total budget of approximately $4.6 billion.2 NTIA used a portion of Recovery Act funds to develop and maintain a nationwide map containing information on broadband service, and to implement the State Broadband Data Act and the Broadband Data Improvement Act. NTIA de-funded nine of the original 233 BTOP grantees for various reasons. These nine projects had a total value of approximately $183.9 million.3 Additionally, all expenditure and budget figures in this analysis exclude seven Public Safety grants, at the request of NTIA. These seven grants total approximately $376.5 million in Recovery Act funding and an additional $136.6 million in non-federal matching funding.4 Grantees directly