Federal officials still are withholding millions in e-rate funds for the Idaho Education Network, Idaho Statesman reporter Cynthia Sewell reports today, and as a result, the IEN plans to ask state lawmakers for another multimillion-dollar bailout when they convene in January. Lawmakers voted last year to give the broadband network that links Idaho high schools $11.4 million state funds to replace the missing federal money; that will only keep the network going until February. At the time, state Department of Administration Director Teresa Luna said she was confident the situation would be resolved and the missing federal money would arrive.

The feds cut off the money – which was anticipated to fund three-quarters of the cost of the broadband network – after an Idaho Supreme Court ruling in a lawsuit questioning the original contract award for the IEN to Education Networks of America and Qwest; the lawsuit still is pending, with its next hearing set for Oct. 10, Sewell reports. That Supreme Court ruling was in March of 2013, but lawmakers weren’t informed until January of this year that the funds had been withheld all that time. They also weren’t informed that the state Department of Administration extended its contract with ENA through 2019, even though it wasn’t yet up for renewal for another year, through 2019, putting the state on the hook for another $10 million.

Sewell’s full report is online here. The IEN mess prompted lawmakers this year to impose new requirements on state agencies to notify the Legislature before renewing big contracts with private vendors.