According to reports, on March 5, Senators John Thune, Ben Ray Luján, and John Barrasso reintroduced the Accelerating Broadband Permits Act. The bill's purpose is to improve executive agencies' processing of permit applications to construct communications facilities on federal land.
As explained in my blog post from August 7, 2024, executive agencies with supervision over federal lands have been found by have problems processing permit applications within the MOBILE NOW Act's 270-day deadline. The Accelerating Broadband Permits Act is intended to help identify instances where the agencies are at risk of missing deadlines deadline and ensure they meet them.
The Accelerating Broadband Permits Act isn't a big, wasteful spending bill. It is an agency accountability bill that could help accelerate broadband network on land held in trust or owned by the federal government. Senators Thune, Luján, and Barrasso deserve credit for bringing this bill back. Hopefully, the Act fares better in the 119th Congress and receives timely consideration.
(At the time of this blog post, no bill number or link to the bill are available on the Senate's website.)
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