A U.S. House committee has launched an investigation into the Rural Utilities Service’s $267 million loan to Open Range Communications Inc., which filed for bankruptcy last month.
Committee leaders sent a bipartisan letter late Wednesday to the RUS administrator requesting documents and a briefing on the Open Range loan as part of a probe into broadband loans made through the 2002 and 2008 farm bills.
The Greenwood Village-based high-speed wireless-network provider received the loan in 2008 from RUS, which is part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The RUS broadband program is intended to extend high-speed Internet service to rural communities.
On Oct. 6, Open Range filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, listing $114 million in assets and $110 million in debt.
The current balance of Open Range’s loan — the largest made by the broadband program — is $73.5 million.
Citing the Open Range bankruptcy and concerns raised by the USDA’s inspector general about broadband-loan-program oversight, the letter seeks an explanation of the RUS application-review process for the Open Range loan and “the oversight RUS conducted to ensure taxpayer funds were used as intended.”
Among the six signing the letter were committee chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., and Diana DeGette, D-Colo., a ranking member of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.
Ann Schrader: 303-954-1967 or aschrader@denverpost.com
