Now I’m just some guy and a blog, but my two cents is that the NTIA should refashion the BTOP Grants to help the States plan and audit their business case, asset inventory and physical requirements for a statewide PSBN build out. They can simply combine it with the $135 Million planned for FirstNet. The NTIA (FirstNet) could then expand the usage of the grant money to utilize any remaining funds, after the planning and audits, to expand application, or cloud development, in support if IT centralization under the PSBN deployment… or even pay for more handset development. 

If FirstNet goes with my model for the Public Private Partnership (see past blog entries or my response to the NTIA NOI back in November) the additional BTOP won’t be necessary being that Private Equity would actually pay for the entire State build out. It may be just me, but seems useless to continue with State sponsored rollouts of LTE trials and pilots when the more important aspect is planning a States business case that may change or modify those very same plans. Plus, this ultimately saves the taxpayers more money. In addition the work in Denver should be basis for any trials or pilot testing of the vendor solutions.

Just some guy and a blog…