[1st-mile-nm] Navajo Nation Loses Internet Signal

[Richard Lowenberg]

Navajo Nation loses Internet signal for computers funded by Gates Foundation

http://indiancountrynews.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3058&Itemid=1

News from Indian Country
By Felicia Fonseca
Albuquerque, New Mexico (AP) 4-08

The thousands of Navajo Nation tribal residents who rely on the Internet to
work, study and communicate across their 27,000-square-mile
(69,930-square-kilometer) reservation were out of luck, as their service
provider shut off access on April 7.

?It?s a sad day,? said Ernest Franklin, director of the tribe?s
Telecommunications Regulatory Commission.

A tribal audit last year revealed that Utah-based provider OnSat Network
Communications Inc. may have double-billed the tribe, and it raised questions
about how the tribe requested bids for the Internet contract.

Those discoveries led the Universal Service Administration Co., which
administers the service under the Federal Communications Commission?s E-rate
program, to tell the tribe March 28 that it would withhold $2.1 million
(euro1.34 million) from OnSat.

Jim Fitting, an attorney for OnSat, said the delay in payment means it cannot
pay subcontractor SES Americom for satellite time.

?With USAC taking this particular position, it doesn?t look like we?re
going to get paid in the foreseeable future,? Fitting said. ?We?re
already $4 million in the hole, so why should we continue doing it??

Most evenings, when residents get off work, the reservation?s chapter houses
are closed, but their wireless signals remain live. So it is common to see
residents with laptops sitting in cars outside working away, a local official
said.

Through the Washington, D.C.-based USAC, the FCC reimburses 85 percent to 90
percent of the costs for Internet service to 70 of the tribe?s 110 chapter
houses, which operate like city governments. The Navajo Nation covers the other
10 percent to 15 percent of the cost and offers service inside the chapter house
and nearby through Wi-Fi.

The USAC told Navajo President Joe Shirley Jr. in a March 28 letter that it is
withholding money for OnSat for 2006-07 because of the possible overbilling and
because the tribe didn?t comply with federal rules that require it to select
the most cost-effective service or equipment through a fair, open and
competitive bidding process.

The USAC asked the tribe to prove OnSat provided the service it is billing for
and has not overbilled.

OnSat won a preliminary injunction last July in Window Rock District Court
barring the tribe?s auditor from further disseminating the audit, said
Fitting, the OnSat lawyer.

?We don?t believe this audit is valid,? Fitting said.

The Navajo Nation has until May to respond to USAC?s letter, and the USAC can
release full or partial funding or continue to withhold funding, said
spokeswoman Laura Betancourt.

Tribal regulator Franklin said he has given the USAC documents detailing how
OnSat was selected and has shown USAC personnel the service operating last year
at sites they randomly selected.

?We proved that we are delivering the bandwidth and that we went through the
proper procurement system,? he said. ?We had to dig up all these
documents.?

OnSat will continue to provide Internet services for the tribe?s Division of
Public Safety and the Office of the President and Vice President, offices whose
satellite service isn?t dependent on FCC funding, Fitting said.

Each Navajo chapter received a grant for computers and Internet access from the
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation?s Native American Access to Technology
Program in 2000. But it wasn?t possible to establish dial-up access ? or
create a wireless grid ? because the reservation largely lacked wired
telephone service.

So the tribe?s Division of Community Development contracted with OnSat in 2001
to provide satellite Internet service to the chapter houses ? even though
satellite Internet technology is costly, slow and unreliable.

The tribe eventually would have stopped using OnSat, Franklin said, but it
needed to sustain the satellite connections for at least two years until a
wireless grid is completed on the reservation.

?It?s not like it?s not being used and it?s just going to go away,? he
said. ?It?s used tremendously by the public. It?s just sad that this has
to happen.?

Navajo President Shirley said reservation residents have come to rely on
Internet access to improve their professional and educational lives.

?It would be a very sad day for the children and people of the Navajo Nation
if the dark clouds descend, the lights go out, and access is denied to the
chapter houses on the reservation, in large part, because USAC has failed to
timely fund our application,? Shirley said in a December letter to Mel
Blackwell, vice president of USAC?s Schools and Libraries Division.

Inscription Chapter House community services coordinator Victoria Bydone said
she is bracing for a backlash from residents who typically park outside her
chapter house in the evening.

?It?s going to be unfortunate,? she said. ?It?s not going to be very
good.?


-- 
Richard Lowenberg
1st-Mile Institute
P.O. Box 8001, Santa Fe, NM 87504
505-989-9110;   505-603-5200 cell
rl at 1st-mile.com  www.1st-mile.com


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