OAKLAND — Internet giants Comcast and AT&T are trying to prevent Oakland from receiving $14 million to build out its capacity for high-speed internet, the latest obstacle to the city’s efforts to close longstanding gaps in online access for its residents.
In objections to Oakland’s latest share of a $3.87 billion California spending package, the two companies argued to the California Public Utilities Commision (CPUC) that the neighborhoods slated for enhanced fiber-optic infrastructure already enjoy faster internet speeds.
Their evidence for that assertion has been kept confidential to everyone but the CPUC, which will review the objections and then decide if the $14 million — a spending plan known locally as “Oakland Connect” — can move forward.
The companies’ claims run counter to speed tests run by the Oakland Unified School District, with help from the tech company HubbleIQ — that indicate over a third of 8,000 tested addresses experienced low download speeds, according to documents.
Those addresses were all identified as having Comcast wireline subscriptions. In a separate test of 3,800 AT&T-subscribed addresses, the school district’s speed test found nearly half had download speeds below what the two companies call fast.
“These speeds call into question whether Comcast’s service meets the Commission’s targets and is sufficient to meet the needs of our residents,” wrote Tony Batalla, head of the city’s IT department, in a Dec. 15 response to Comcast’s objection.
A spokesperson for Comcast declined an interview request Tuesday, promising the issue is more “nuanced and complex” than the objection states, but citing short-staffing during the holidays as reason the company could not immediately elaborate on its position.
The companies claims have put them at the center of the controversy around how public dollars are spent to boost high-speed internet capacity — a statewide process that has disproportionately reduced funding for urban areas like East Oakland and South Central Los Angeles in favor of wealthier suburbs, from Walnut Creek to Livermore to Beverly Hills.
OAKLAND, CA – OCT. 8: Castlemont High School 11th grader Ricky Logan, 16, receives a new laptop from teacher Ace Crow at Castlemont High School in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020. The school handed out about 400 laptops and hotspots to students during the event. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group) (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
“It’s just egregious,” Patrick Messac, a city official who leads the digital-equity advocacy group #OaklandUndivided, said in an interview. “They fund deployment in these really wealthy areas where there’s no oversight.”
The $14 million initially set aside for Oakland — a large chunk of the $24.5 million slated for Alameda County at large — is intended to build out the “last mile” of broadband connectivity, or tether parts of the city to the larger internet backbone built along major interstate highways.
The issue hits close to home for high-school students in East Oakland, who said in interviews that everything from their post-pandemic education to FaceTimes calls with relatives to simple entertainment options were a nightmare of frozen screens, lagging videos and endless troubleshooting.
Some local institutions have taken the persistent web problems facing residents into their own hands.
Patricia Wells, who heads the Oakland Housing Authority, has advocated at the state level to turn internet access into a fixed utility, while the authority’s board has approved a pilot program to provide free WiFi to residents of the city’s four largest public housing communities.
“We use WiFi to contact loved ones, to make medical appointments — and our children, oh my goodness, so much of their education for their expanding minds is based on research and online tools,” Wells said in an interview. “We need to ensure they’re staying connected and not isolated.”
Earlier this year, California officials tasked with spending billions to bridge “middle-mile” gaps in broadband coverage across the state — connecting underserved areas to surrounding communities with faster internet speeds — severely shortchanged East Oakland, reversing earlier plans to build infrastructure much more expansively in the area.
SAN RAFAEL, CA – JULY 13: A sign is posted in front of a Comcast service center on July 13, 2015 in San Rafael, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
The funding rollout, which still is far from complete, relies on data-driven maps that the officials themselves, in emails to this news organization, admitted were flawed.
Digital-equity experts have not minced words about the updated plans. The disproportionate slashing of Oakland’s broadband expansion, one said, was equivalent to “good old-fashioned redlining” that shortchanges Oakland because there aren’t enough internet subscribers for the service providers to turn a profit.
“The maps rely on data about broadband infrastructure provided mostly by the ISPs themselves, and do not consider factors such as affordability of service and income levels, resulting in a picture of the digital divide that does not match the reality on the ground, particularly in urban areas,” Batalla, the city’s technology chief, said in an email.
CPUC, the agency responsible for distributing state funding for high-speed internet upgrades, is expected to make a decision on Comcast and AT&T’s objections to this latest tranche of funding in the coming weeks.
