Information Collection Being Submitted for Review and Approval to the Office of Management and Budget

AGENCY:

Federal Communications Commission.

ACTION:

Notice and request for comments.

SUMMARY:

As part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork burdens, and as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of 1995, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC or the Commission) invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on the following information collection. Comments are requested concerning: Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the Commission, including whether the information shall have practical utility; the accuracy of the Commission's burden estimate; ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information collected; ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on the respondents, including the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology; and ways to further reduce the information collection burden on small business concerns with fewer than 25 employees.

The Commission may not conduct or sponsor a collection of information unless it displays a currently valid Office of Management and Budget (OMB) control number. No person shall be subject to any penalty for failing to comply with a collection of information subject to the PRA that does not display a valid OMB control number.

DATES:

Written comments should be submitted on or before January 11, 2018. If you anticipate that you will be submitting comments, but find it difficult to do so within the period of time allowed by this notice, you should advise the contacts listed below as soon as possible.

ADDRESSES:

Direct all PRA comments to Nicholas A. Fraser, OMB, via email Nicholas_A._Fraser@omb.eop.gov; and to Cathy Williams, FCC, via email PRA@fcc.gov and to Cathy.Williams@fcc.gov. Include in the comments the OMB control number as shown in the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION below.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

For additional information or copies of the information collection, contact Cathy Williams at (202) 418-2918. To view a copy of this information collection request (ICR) submitted to OMB: (1) Go to the web page http://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain , (2) look for the section of the web page called “Currently Under Review,” (3) click on the downward-pointing arrow in the “Select Agency” box below the “Currently Under Review” heading, (4) select “Federal Communications Commission” from the list of agencies presented in the “Select Agency” box, (5) click the “Submit” button to the right of the “Select Agency” box, (6) when the list of FCC ICRs currently under review appears, look for the OMB control number of this ICR and then click on the ICR Reference Number. A copy of the FCC submission to OMB will be displayed.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

As part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork burdens, and as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of 1995 (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520), the Federal Communications Commission (FCC or the Commission) invites the general public and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on the following information collection. Comments are requested concerning: Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the Commission, including whether the information shall have practical utility; the accuracy of the Commission's burden estimate; ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information collected; ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on the respondents, including the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology; and ways to further reduce the information collection burden on small business concerns with fewer than 25 employees.

OMB Control Number: 3060-XXXX.

Title: Mobility Fund Phase II Challenge Process.

Form Number: N/A.

Type of Review: New information collection.

Respondents: Business or other for-profit entities, not-for-profit institutions, and state, local or tribal governments.

Estimated Number of Respondents and Responses: 500 respondents and 500 responses.

Estimated Time per Response: 204 hours for challengers; 71 hours for challenged parties.

Frequency of Response: One-time reporting requirement.

Obligation To Respond: Required to obtain or retain benefits. Statutory authority for the currently approved information collection is contained in sections 154, 254, and 303(r) of the Communications Act, as amended, 47 U.S.C. 4, 254, 303(r).

Estimated Total Annual Burden: 78,725 hours.

Total Annual Costs: None.

Nature and Extent of Confidentiality: To the extent the information submitted pursuant to this information collection is determined to be confidential, it will be protected by the Commission. If a respondent seeks to have information collected pursuant to this information collection withheld from public inspection, the respondent may request confidential treatment pursuant to section 0.459 of the Commission's rules for such information. See 47 CFR 0.459.

Privacy Act Impact Assessment: No impact(s).

Needs and Uses: A request for approval of this new information collection is being submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to obtain the full three-year clearance from OMB. In its November 2011 USF/ICC Transformation Order (FCC 11-161), the Commission established the Mobility Fund, which consists of two phases. Mobility Fund Phase I (MF-I) provided one-time universal service support payments to immediately accelerate deployment of mobile broadband services. MF-II will use a reverse auction to provide ongoing universal service support payments to continue to advance deployment of such services. The Commission adopted the rules and framework for MF-I in the USF/ICC Transformation Order, and sought comment in an accompanying further notice of proposed rulemaking on the proposed framework for MF-II. In its February 2017 Mobility Fund II Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (MF-II Report and Order and/or FNPRM) (FCC 17-11), the FCC adopted the rules and framework for moving forward expeditiously with the MF-II auction. Among other things, the Commission stated in the MF-II Report and Order that, prior to the auction, it would establish a map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support based on the most recently available FCC Form 477 mobile wireless coverage data, and provide a limited timeframe for parties to challenge those initial determinations during the pre-auction process. The Commission sought comment in the accompanying Mobility Fund II FNPRM on how to best design a robust, targeted MF-II challenge process that efficiently resolves disputes about the areas eligible for MF-II support. In August 2017, the Commission released an Order on Reconsideration and Second Report and Order (Challenge Process Order) (FCC 17-102) in which it (1) reconsidered its earlier decision to use FCC Form 477 data to compile the map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support and decided it would instead conduct a new, one-time data collection with specified data parameters tailored to MF-II to determine the areas in which there is deployment of qualified LTE that will be used (together with high-cost disbursement data available from the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC)) for this purpose, and (2) adopted a streamlined challenge process that will efficiently resolve disputes about areas deemed presumptively ineligible for MF-II support. The map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support will serve as the starting point for the challenge process pursuant to which an interested party (challenger) may initiate a challenge with respect to one or more areas initially deemed ineligible for MF-II support (i.e., areas not listed on the Commission's map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support and challenged parties can respond to challenges. A challenger seeking to initiate a challenge of one or more areas initially deemed ineligible in the Commission's map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support may do so via the online challenge portal developed by USAC for this purpose (the USAC portal). For each state, a challenger must (1) identify the area(s) it seeks to challenge, (2) submit detailed proof of a lack of unsubsidized, qualified 4G LTE coverage in each challenged area in the form of actual outdoor speed test data collected using the standardized parameters specified by the Commission in the Challenge Process Order and any other parameters the Commission or the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau and Wireline Competition Bureau (the Bureaus) may implement, and (3) certify its challenge.

After the challenge window closes, the USAC system will use an automated challenge validation process developed by USAC to validate a challenger's evidence and will determine which challenged areas pass validation and which fail. Once all valid challenges have been identified, a challenged party that chooses to respond to any valid challenge(s) will have a response window within which to submit additional data via the online USAC portal. A challenged party may submit technical information that is probative regarding the validity of a challenger's speed tests (i.e., information demonstrating that the challenger's speed tests are invalid or do not accurately reflect network performance), including speed test data and other device-specific data collected from transmitter monitoring software or, alternatively, may submit its own speed test data that conforms to the same standards and requirements specified by the Commission and the Bureaus for challengers.

In conjunction with the qualified 4G LTE data separately collected pursuant to OMB 3060-1242 that will be used to create the map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support, the information collected under this new MF-II challenge process collection will enable the Commission to efficiently resolve disputes concerning the eligibility or ineligibility of an area initially deemed ineligible for MF-II support and establish the final map of areas eligible for such support, thereby furthering the Commission's goal of targeting MF-II support to areas that lack adequate mobile voice and broadband coverage absent subsidies through a transparent process.