Why didn't PA back Philly's $22M US internet proposal?

Why didn't Pennsylvania endorse Philadelphia's request for $22 million in federal Recovery Act funds to extend the city's Internet system?  "Our evaluators thought others were better," said Gary Tuma, spokesman for Gov. Rendell. Like Intenet connections for rural Pennsylvania. And a Free Library plan to teach the poor to use computers.

Some city Internet advocates blamed corporate Internet providers for Pennsylvania's non-support. They noted that David L. Cohen, the Comcast executive vice president, told Bloomberg News last week the company opposed "applications to provide service in areas where there is already broadband service" from Comcast.

"The telephone companies and Comcast didn't want this to happen," Todd Wolfson, a Rutgers professor who helped write the city's application, told me. "The market model, which they champion, hasn't gotten the Internet into the hands of people who are working class."

"It certainly doesn't help if Comcast objects. Or if Gov. Rendell did not put Philadelphia's application on his list," said Beth McConnell, Philadelphia-based executive director of the Ford Foundation-backed Media and Democracy Coalition, which lobbied Congress to fund broadband for the poor.

But Tuma said Comcast's stand wasn't a factor: "We didn't get any comment from Comcast, pro or con," he said. Corporate opposition or gubernatorial indifference won't necessarily keep any plan from getting funded, says Tom Power, chief of staff to NTIA head Lawrence Strickling and former general counsel at Blue Bell-based Fiberlink.

Philadelphia chief technology officer Allan Frank says he understands why people might not see a city served by Comcast and Verizon as "underserved." But price matters, he added: "There ought to be affordable Internet." More in today's PhillyDeals print column here.