Rural Health Care

Providing Pilot Program Eligible Costs

All telecommunications providers, Internet service providers, and other vendors may receive up to 85% of eligible Pilot Program costs. Network design firms and various types of construction companies may also participate. Project participants may choose to self-provision for these services and/or equipment in that they may do their own design work and/or network deployment, subject to the FCC's competitive bidding requirements. This program will refer to all of these entities collectively as Vendors.

Eligible Pilot Program costs include, but are not limited to:

  • the non-recurring costs for design, engineering, materials, and construction of fiber facilities and other broadband infrastructure;
  • the non-recurring costs of engineering, furnishing (i.e., as delivered from the manufacturer), and installing network equipment;
  • the recurring and non-recurring costs of operating and maintaining the constructed network once the network is operational; and
  • carrier-provided transmission services and the costs for subscribing to such facilities and services.

All vendors that supply these services or equipment may submit bids for Pilot Program projects. Vendors interested in submitting bids should familiarize themselves with the 2007 Rural Health Care Pilot Program Selection Order, which details the RHCPP network components eligible and ineligible for support. Additional information concerning the Pilot Program is available on the FCC's Rural Health Care Pilot Program page.


Last modified on 4/7/2008