SHLB Poles Symposium

The SHLB Coalition hosted this event to bring greater visibility to the efforts of state broadband leaders in addressing the issues around pole attachment rates and practices. Several non-profit and commercial broadband providers have raised a concern that current pole attachment practices could make it difficult to fulfill the nation's commitment to build out broadband networks to all homes and anchor institutions by the end of this decade. Pole owners are equally concerned about the difficulties of managing a multitude of pole attachments and replacement requests on their limited resources. SHLB has recommended that States set up working groups or task forces to help expedite dispute resolution and provide a neutral forum for processing pole replacements and attachments quickly and safely, an idea that NTIA included in its Notice of Funding Opportunity for the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program. The purpose of this symposium was to bring together interested parties to discuss how these Federal rules and State working groups are performing and whether other States should take similar action.

This event took place at HWG LLP Conference Room 1919 M Street NW, Washington, DC 20036.

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