Glass half empty

I've been very happy with the way that the approval process has been going: the PIA reviews got going early, and have kept moving at a good pace, the vast majority of my clients have made it through the process, and even some Priority 2 applications have been approved.

Then a number jumped out at me from today's SLD News Brief: $926 million in funding approved. With the extra cash which the FCC unfairly rolled over into this year, that's less than one third of the fund.

I remember going to a USAC board meeting where they almost hit a target of 80% of all apps processed by June 30. At the time, I remember thinking that the target should be 100%, but now 80% seems to good to be true. I thought this year was going well, but I can see that the glass was half empty. Well, actually, five-sixths empty, since only $458 million (less than one sixth of the fund) had been approved by the start of the funding year.

Mel Blackwell needs to stand up and say that all Telecom Services, Internet Access or Basic Maintenance FRNs should be funded by June 30. Ideally, they should be funded by May 31, so the service providers have time to set up their accounting systems to discount. As an interim goal, 70% of apps should be processed by May 31, 90% by June 30.

Basic maintenance is a problem since it's Priority 2, but if they sent out FCDLs that say something like "Will be funded if funds are available" (instead of "As yet unfunded"), I think we could count that as an application processed. Even better, move Basic Maintenance to Priority 1, or pre-fund Priority 2.

The good, the bad and the ugly

So the proposed Eligible Services List is out. Of course, I'll be submitting fulsome comments to the FCC, but here are the highlights I see.

The Good:

1. "Basic telephone service" has been expanded to include Centrex, and some other services. It makes no difference to the way applicants have been doing things, but it does cut off at the knees the new invisible USAC rules about Centrex having to be on the Form 470 unless you can show that you had Centrex prior to the start of the funding year (or is it prior to the filing of the Form 470?).

The Bad:

1. Anti-spam still not eligible. With 90% of all email now being spam, no one runs an email server without anti-spam. It is necessary.
2. Anti-virus still not eligible. No one should connect a computer to the Internet without anti-virus. It is necessary.
3. Web filtering still not eligible. It just seems fair that if you have to filter to get E-Rate funding, filtering should be eligible.

The Ugly:

1. Web hosting. Actually, this year's definition is much better than previous years, but it's still going to be a year of pain. It's like Cinderella's ugly stepsister trying on the glass slipper. The ESL has a glass-slipper definition, and every value-added Web host is trying to force their product into it. And since most of the rules in the E-Rate program are secret, the glass slipper is hidden inside a bag, with just a little bit sticking out, so there's no way to know whether removing a toe would make the foot fit. And the poor applicants are going to end up holding the bag.
2. Basic Maintenance. I didn't notice any changes to the ESL in this area, and change is badly needed. It would have been a miracle if the ESL could have fixed all the problems with maintenance, but this ESL does nothing to help.
3. "File servers." A quick review shows 2 places (plus the index) where the term "file server" is still used in place of the term "server." The number of sightings keeps going down, but this has been a pet peeve for years.

The ESL is here! Almost.

The FCC has announced the new proposed Eligible Services List. The actual list isn't attached to the announcement, but ought to be around on Monday. But the announcement does describe the changes coming:

1. Centrex is now basic telephone service.
2. Clarifies the use of the Internet for distance learning and video conferencing.
3. Clarifies that calendaring can be considered an "ancillary" part of an email service.
4. Clarifies Web hosting.
5. "Failover" has apparently been added to "redundant" as unfundable.

My instacomments:

1. It's about time.
2. Ho hum. They keep clarifying, and some company comes along and thinks it's outsmarted the regulations, and they clarify again.
3. It's about time that someone realized that it's hard to get email without calendaring.
4. I'll believe it when I see it. These regulations have been getting somewhat less vague over the last 3 years, but they still confuse most applicants and service providers.
5. I understand the need to keep districts from buying two of everything, but the rules really should acknowledge that sometimes, failover/redundancy is good network engineering. An applicant's best friend: "load balancing."

I'm sure I'll have more to say when I see the actual list.

30% rule lives on?

So I was perusing some of the denial reasons for 2007-2008, just to get a look at the new FCDL comments with their expanded length, and what did I see: several denials due to the 30% rule. How can this be? The FCC gutted the 30% Rule by requiring the SLD to get applicant authorization for any cost allocations.

And in my experience, PIA has been toeing the line. Every time they wanted to change the amount of one of my clients' FRNs, they asked me if it was OK. So how are these people getting denied? I can think of two possibilities.

First, they asked the applicant if the cost allocation is OK, then got no response. After 15 days, they do the cost allocation and invoke the 30% Rule and all the funding is gone.

Second, they asked the applicant if the cost allocation is OK, without mentioning the 30% Rule, the oblivious applicant OKs the cost allocation, then gets blind-sided by the 30% Rule. I had assumed that applicants agreeing to reduce the amount requested would not be subject to the 30% Rule, but now I wonder.

I hope this is simply a case of a few applicants not responding to PIA requests for confirmation of cost allocations. Because there's no way the FCC, in its current mood, is going to uphold the denial of entire FRNs when the applicant has agreed to reduce the amount requested.

The FCC should just come out and say: "The 30% Rule is bad: it punishes honest mistakes and doesn't save the SLD any work. We're tossing it out."

And while they're at it: "The 2-in-5 Rule is bad: it makes a complicated mess, and hasn't helped spread around Priority 2 funding. We're tossing it out."

Things that make you go "Hmmm..."

Ever notice that the online Form 471 requires that you put in a recurring charge for maintenance FRNs, but the online Item 21 Attachment only allows a one-time charge? Hmmm....

Black clouds at PIA

This isn't a problem yet, but I just know it's going to be. Another case where two separate things have been fudged into one part of the form to simplify things, much like the BEN/location confusion.

The background:
Two clients currently under PIA review have basic maintenance requests, and have separate admin buildings. These admin buildings do not have internal connections components which are necessary for transport of data from instructional areas, so they aren't eligible for Internal Connections funding. However, they do rely on the internal connections in another building for their Internet access.

The problem:
Block 4 is used for two purposes: discount calculation and determination of locations receiving service. Normally, the two coincide. However, in this case, the two purposes require different Block 4s. For discount calculation, I think the admin building should be in there, since it relies on some of the components being maintained in order to receive Priority 1 service. But since no equipment in the admin is eligible, the admin building will not be receiving maintenance under the E-Rate contract.

So for discount calculation, the admin building should be in Block 4. But for determining the location where service is performed, it should not be.

The resolution:
I wish I knew. Maybe PIA has a procedure for this, but the storm clouds gathering on the horizon indicate an FCC appeal on the way.

Refresh fatigue

I'm getting tired of hitting my refresh button. It's about 2:30 pm, and I still can't sign up for the SLD's fall training sessions. What's the deal? I've been poised to get my registration in for hours now.

A call to the Client Service Bureau confirmed that they are still planning to begin accepting registration today, but the nice woman I talked to couldn't say what time. (I forgot to ask who signs her paycheck, Vangent or Solix?)

I can see not opening registration until noon, to give all those Californians time to get to work, but at this point, it's getting to be unfair to easterners: it's summer time, which means many school employees will be leaving by 3:30 or 4:00.