This dataset serves as the foundation for the Connect America Fund Broadband Map (CAF Map), an interactive online map that shows the impact of the Connect America Fund (CAF) on broadband expansion to close the digital divide in rural America. The CAF Map displays the geographic areas that are eligible for CAF support, as well as the specific fixed locations where carriers participating in the program have built out mass-market, high-speed Internet service. The dataset includes address, latitude and longitude coordinates, carrier name, deployment year and minimum speeds offered for every location where CAF-supported service is available.

The information in this dataset comes directly from carriers, which submit broadband deployment data annually through USAC’s High Cost Universal Broadband (HUBB) portal showing where they have built out service using CAF funding. The current dataset is based on data certified in the HUBB to reflect deployment completed as of December 31, 2021. USAC independently verifies deployment to a random sample of locations reported in the HUBB each year to monitor carrier compliance with CAF build-out obligations.

This dataset provides information about total dollars disbursed to Eligible Telecommunication Carriers (ETCs) within the High Cost Program by month and year since January 2003.

The Eligible Locations Adjustment Process (ELAP) is a voluntary challenge process established by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to review and potentially adjust broadband deployment obligations for carriers participating in the Connect America Fund (CAF) Phase II Auction program if the total number of locations funded by the program exceeds the number of actual locations on the ground. In 2021, 27 CAF Phase II Auction winners seeking to adjust their deployment obligations in 23 states submitted the appropriate location information required to participate in ELAP. USAC used certain location information from those filings to populate this public map, the ELAP Map, so that prospective outside stakeholders could review data submitted by carriers and determine whether to contest it during the stakeholder challenge phase of the process. The stakeholder challenge phase is open to individuals, non-governmental entities and governmental entities (including state and Tribal governments) that have demonstrated a verifiable interest in obtaining broadband service supported by the Connect America Fund in areas challenged by CAF II Auction carriers as part of ELAP.