Technology

More like, large corporations not at all invested in local communities are now empowered to completely run rough shod over local governance processes. They’re actually more likely to pay for folks to stall out slow approval processes so that they can take advantage of this law and start building, especially when the permit would have likely been denied because it didn’t consider easements, fire or flood risks, building and local regulatory standards, or any other manner of things. So this actually increases the likelihood of bribes, and ensuring that corporations actually pay less to your local government and more to personal pockets of those being bribed, while simultaneously making the buildouts less safe and compliant with greater risks to the local community. Basically a lose lose for local folks, and a win win for a giant corporation.

A better version of these flawed tactics would’ve been that failure to meet timelines would open the project to public vote and also that every project would require a public option (eg government supplied bid on the infrastructure) to compete. That way if timeline expires, it’s not automatically awarded to people who have a vested interest in it expiring at the expense of a community. It could be awarded to a local municipal project instead.

Or alternatively, companies can bribe a few local politicians to stall, then start building anyways when the deadline hits.