Testimony before the Texas Senate Committee on Finance on HB 9

Testimony before the Texas Senate Committee on Finance
Regarding creating a $5B state broadband fund through the state budget surplus
Hunter Hamberlin, State Policy Manager
Taxpayers Protection Alliance
May 15, 2023

Good morning, my name is Hunter Hamberlin. I am State Policy Manager of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA), a nonprofit, nonpartisan taxpayer advocacy and consumer watchdog organization.

I want to thank the Texas Senate Committee on Finance for the opportunity to testify. Respectfully, TPA opposes this bill on behalf of taxpayers throughout Texas.

Texas has allocated $600 million in state and federal funds for better broadband maps and to provide grants to help unserved or underserved areas. According to Telecompetitor, Texas is set to receive around $3.5 billion through the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program.

Creating a $5 billion broadband fund funded by state taxpayers is excessive and excessive taxpayer funding will lead to taxpayer dollars being wasted.

Allocating more taxpayer funds to government-owned networks creates another problem and does not help close the digital divide. A TPA report on GONs published this year found that “state and local governments, intent on building their own broadband networks to service their citizens often discovered that the networks weren’t as successful as they hoped because rising costs and lower-than-expected take rates ensured that the efforts would lose money and leave taxpayers picking up the tab.”

As an example of wastefulness, Dallas may build its own GON for $82 million, but the city is hardly lacking in internet options. In fact, both Spectrum and T-Mobile Home Internet cover more than 98 percent of Dallas, according to BroadbandNow.com.

This year’s state budget has a surplus of more than $30 billion. It would be in the best interest of Texas taxpayers to be frugal with this surplus. Federal and state governments have been allocating money to broadband funds for years, and they have placed few guardrails to oversee how those funds are used to prevent taxpayer waste.

Using taxpayer money for an excessive state broadband fund is a waste of money and fiscally irresponsible. The Texas state legislature should focus the budget surplus on true infrastructure needs. TPA encourages you to reject this bill. Thank you.