Hays ? The chasm between Republicans and Democrats in Washington has gone digital.

Stuck in the middle are two northwest Kansas broadband suppliers: Eagle Communications and Rural Telephone and its subsidiary, Nex-Tech.

Eagle CEO and President Gary Shorman was one of five people testifying before the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology.

He was there to cry foul over the federal government’s $101 million loan and grant to competitor Rural Telephone.

That money, slightly more than half of it a loan, will go to build a high-speed broadband network in 21 towns and 26 rural areas covering more than 4,600 square miles in Decatur, Ellis, Gove, Graham, Norton, Osborne, Phillips, Rooks, Sheridan, Smith and Trego counties.

That area also would include the city of Hays, which is at the heart of the debate.

Shorman complains it’s not fair to be forced to compete against someone receiving government support. He also contends that was not the intent of the federal broadband project — part of the much larger Recovery Act — designed to make broadband available to rural areas.

Instead, he said, Ellis County essentially is covered by high-speed broadband service, an issue he repeated often before the subcommittee.

Rural General Manager and CEO Larry Sevier said it’s an issue of sustainability.

“Rural Ellis County wouldn’t stand on its own,” he said. “But neither would places like Norcatur. … Any of these remote rural areas will just not stand on their own. It takes both the doughnut and the doughnut hole to make this work.”

That sustainability issue was brought up by one subcommittee member.

The two-hour hearing, streamed live over the Internet, was something of a back-and-forth banter, Republicans critical of the program while Democrats showed support.

At one point, Shorman was asked if Eagle had applied for any of the broadband money. Eagle did, but was rejected.

“You were rejected and someone else wasn’t?” asked Anna G. Eshoo, D-Calif. “Is that your beef?”

“The heart of it is we’re wasting taxpayer dollars,” Shorman said. “My dollars.”

He did, however, say it gives an unfair advantage.

“If there’s a fair playing field,” he said, “if one provider has a boatload of government money, it makes it very hard for a small providers.”

Sevier wasn’t invited to testify and only heard about the hearing when a trade publication reporter called to inquire about Eagle’s complaints.

Subcommittee members wondered why the administrator of the agency lending the money to Rural hadn’t been invited to explain why the loan was justified. Additional hearings are slated, however.

Sevier said he expects the project to see close oversight by the federal agency that loaned out the money.

“We expect to have all of this gone through with a fine tooth comb, which RUS (Rural Utilities Service) has always done,” he said. “The federal government is not going to just hand out loans or grants without making sure they’re going to get paid back. What they don’t want to happen is for a company to not have a sustainable business and two or three years from now they go under and the money is all lost.”

Despite the controversy, Sevier said they plan to move ahead with the project.

“We’re still working toward getting started in the area as soon as weather permits,” he said.

“I can’t overemphasize enough of the positives of what $101 million is going to do for the state of Kansas and what it will do for economic development in the state of Kansas,” Sevier said.