Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF)

Colorado Broadband Office Funding, News

Updated October 19, 2020

On January 30, 2020, the Federal Communications Commission adopted the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Report and Order, which establishes the framework for the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF), a $20.4 billion fund to bring high speed fixed broadband service to rural homes and small businesses. 

On June 10, the FCC released a public notice on final application procedures for Phase I of the RDOF auction. The Office of Economics and Analytics, the Rural Broadband Auctions Task Force, and the Wireline Competition Bureau issued a public notice on June 11, 2020, making available a guide that provides technical and mathematical details regarding the bidding procedures for Phase I.

What you need to know:

  • $20.4 billion will be awarded using reverse auctions in two phases.
  • The Phase I auction (Auction 904), totaling $16 billion
  • Colorado has 77,625 eligible locations totaling $620 million in eligible funding.
  • All entities planning to participate in Auction 904 were required to submit a short-form application by July 15, 2020. On October 13, the FCC identified 386 applicants that are qualified to bid in Auction 904.
  • Timeline:
    • June 15, 2020: Auction Application Tutorial Available
    • July 1-15, 2020: Short-Form Application (FCC Form 183) Filing Window
    • October 26, 2020: Mock Auction Begins
    • October 29, 2020: Auction Begins

Useful Links:

FCC’s Auction 904 RDOF web page: https://www.fcc.gov/auction/904

View all Public Notices, Letters, Orders, and News Releases related to RDOF: https://www.fcc.gov/auction/904/releases

The FCC released Auction 904 Bidding Education Materials on October 2, 2020: https://www.fcc.gov/auction/904/education. Materials include:

Final Auction Procedures (June 11, 2020)

Data

Final List of Eligible Areas (October 8, 2020)

On October 8, 2020, the FCC released the Final List of Eligible Areas. View the map and download the data here:

Final List of Eligible Areas

Updated List of Eligible Areas (June 25, 2020)

On June 25, 2020, the FCC released an updated list and map of eligible areas for the RDOF Phase I Auction.

Preliminary List of Eligible Areas (March 17, 2020)

Colorado data (processed by the CBO)

County Summary and Static County Maps

To provide an overview of preliminary eligible areas in Colorado, the CBO has processed the initial eligible areas and created the following.

Open RDOF County Summary in new window

RDOF-County-Summary

Open County Maps Folder in new window

Eligible Areas and Challenges (Shapefiles and CSVs)

Preliminary Eligible Areas – Colorado
This data is a subset of the eligible census blocks released on March 17, 2020 containing Colorado Census Blocks. The attributes also includes the challenge data listed below.

Challenges – Colorado
Note: The FCC does not aggregate challenge data, so the CBO staff attempted to identify, download, and aggregate challenge in Colorado. We may have missed something! We do not guarantee this data to be complete. The data includes challenges from the following companies: CenturyLink, Charter, Comcast, Consolidated Communications, Skybeam, Vyve, Wiggins, and Zirkel.

Data from FCC

Public Notice announcing the release of the preliminary list: https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-20-275A1.pdf 

The preliminary list of the eligible census blocks, associated Census Block Groups and Tracts, and Reserve Prices are available in CSV and Shapefile format here: www.fcc.gov/auction/904

The Initial Eligible Areas are also viewable in the FCC’s online map of Auction 904 Initial Eligible Areas

Supporting Data:

Education/Events:

FCC RDOF Phase I Auction Webinar For Government Officials (May 20, 2020)

More information

CBO RDOF Auction 904 Ask the Experts Webinar (May 12, 2020)

Click here to download Slides. Visit the event page for more information

Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I Auction Webinar (May 5, 2020)

Webinar slides can be downloaded at: https://www.fcc.gov/auction/904/education