STATEMENT OF 
COMMISSIONER MICHAEL J. COPPS
Re: Inquiry Concerning the Deployment of Advanced Telecommunications Capability to All 
Americans in a Reasonable and Timely Fashion, and Possible Steps to Accelerate Such 
Deployment Pursuant to Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, as Amended 
by the Broadband Data Improvement Act; A National Broadband Plan for Our Future, 
GN Docket Nos. 09-137, 09-51, Sixth Broadband Deployment Report
The sixth time is the charm. At last—a section 706 Report where broadband is really 
broadband, where zip codes are not surrogates for subscribers, and where the documented failure 
to connect millions upon millions of Americans disproves previous FCC findings that broadband 
is being reasonably and timely deployed. I am pleased to support the Broadband Deployment 
Report that we issue today.
Pursuant to section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, as amended by the 
Broadband Data Improvement Act—now section 1302(b) of Title 47 of the United States Code—
the Commission is tasked with determining whether advanced telecommunications capability is 
being made available to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion. With that statutory 
mandate, Congress recognized how critical access to broadband is to the well-being of our 
country. Last year, Congress and the Administration reaffirmed the importance of broadband by 
charging the FCC to develop a national strategy for deployment and adoption. For all of the 
challenges this country faces—whether it’s job creation, education, energy, climate change and 
the environment, international competitiveness, health care or equal opportunity—there is no 
solution that does not have a broadband component to it.
So while this may technically be the Sixth Report, it is—in my opinion—the first really 
credible effort by the Commission to deliver a report based on data of the quality and granularity 
needed to be truly responsive to Congress. With this Report, we have a much more 
comprehensive view of where our country stands when it comes to broadband availability, and 
we have measures for assessing our progress nationally and as compared with our global 
competitors.
By relying on an inadequate and unrefined approach to data collection for the previous 
five reports, the Commission seriously defaulted on its statutory responsibility. Going down the 
same old path here would have done a further injustice to this country’s reinvigorated 
commitment to broadband. In early data collection exercises, the Commission used information 
from service providers that simply reported on which zip codes had at least one subscriber to 
broadband service at a speed of 200 kbps or higher. I still fail to see how anyone ever viewed this 
approach as indicative of anything useful. The false impression left by that approach was that 
everyone in a zip code was fully connected to high-speed broadband when all we really knew was 
that one person or business somewhere—perhaps on the very fringe of a zip code—subscribed to 
a minimum-speed service. That told us nothing about the extent to which broadband was 
available within a zip code or the quality of that service. Even though the majority of the 
Commission recognized the limited usefulness of the data in previous reports, it nonetheless 
concluded that the information was accurate enough to make a judgment about the state of 
broadband deployment for all Americans. As such, it found that the percentage of zip codes with 
at least one broadband subscriber—97% of the zip codes—adequately reflected the percentage of 
the population with access to broadband, and found, therefore, that all broadband was being 
deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion.
Good data is a prerequisite to good policy choices. The five preceding reports lacked 
such data and the results were … poor policy choices. This is even clearer now than it was at the 
time of those reports, given the depth of data we that has been mined as part of the lengthy, fact-
driven process that resulted in the National Broadband Plan, including input collected from the 
newly-revised FCC Form 477 requiring providers to report broadband subscribership by Census 
Tract instead of zip code. The National Broadband Plan observed that in the United States today 
there are digital divides when it comes to access to high-quality, value-laden, affordable 
broadband, between the haves and have-nots, between those living in big cities and those living in 
rural areas or on tribal lands, between the able-bodied and persons with disabilities. Today’s 
Report sadly confirms the existence of those digital divides. With these data-reliant observations, 
how could the Commission possibly continue to conclude that all is well and good when it comes 
to broadband deployment to all Americans? With our heads in the sand for so many years, is it 
any surprise other nations catapulted ahead of the United States in the broadband race?
To remedy the negative findings of the Report, the next step—as mandated by statute—is 
for the Commission to take immediate action to accelerate deployment of such capability through 
the removal of barriers to infrastructure investment and the promotion of competition in the 
market. Fortunately, through the recommendations of the National Broadband Plan, we have a 
sound path available to us. The findings of today’s Report summon us to implement those 
recommendations and thereby address our statutory responsibilities. This Commission stands 
poised to move forward on such a path. As with all great infrastructure challenges this country
has faced, we must move forward in a collaborative effort, where the Commission and industry, 
along with consumers, are working together for an America with ubiquitous, affordable, high-
speed, value-laden broadband. While there is no doubt that broadband deployment and adoption 
have grown significantly over the last decade, we still have a long way to go to ensure that all 
Americans have broadband access. 
While I support today’s Report as one that is light years ahead of its prior iterations, there 
is still room for improvement. We must strive to make future reports even more detailed and 
thorough, particularly as broadband mapping information becomes available pursuant to the 
Broadband Data Improvement Act. In addition, it is critical that the United States understand, 
track and compare its approaches to broadband with those of our global competitors even more 
deeply than we do here. To that end, I hope to see a more in-depth global dimension to future 
reports. I am confident that the course we start down with today’s Report will lead us to just such 
an outcome.
I commend everyone at the Commission—and they are many—who contributed their 
expertise and analysis to the production of this much-improved Report.