FCC Staff Workshop on Broadband and E-Gov/Civic Engagement

FCC Staff Workshop on Broadband and E-Gov/Civic Engagement

On Thursday August 6, the Federal Communications Commission kicked-off a series of workshops on devising a National Broadband Plan will a meeting focused on broadband, electronic government and civic engagement. The aim of the workshops is to facilitate a frank, very public discussion about broadband policy.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski was informal in his opening remarks, but noted that he was glad that e-gov is the first topic of the workshops since the FCC is engaged in a real time experiment in civic engagement. He said "everything flows from civic engagement. An active public offering its best ideas is the foundation of the solutions to all our challenges, and in the 21st century there is no excuse for not connecting every American with one another and their government." He said he's interested in "ideas that meet the moment."

The goal of the first broadband workshop was to evaluate how broadband can improve the performance of government specifically in terms of transparency and citizen participation and more generally in terms of effectiveness and efficiency. The day's first panel offered a view from within government.

The panel included Vivek Kundra, the nation's first Federal Chief Information Officer. He talked about the three revolutions experienced by Americans: agricultural, industrial and now, technology. He sees technology as enabling government to focus on citizens first and to deliver transparent democracy. These distinguish the technology revolution. He said using technology allows government to simplify access to services and to facilitate citizen participation.

Kundra also talked about democratizing data, allowing the public to make use of government datasets, including through the use of social media like Twitter and Facebook. Data.gov holds 100,000 federal data feeds and the tools to access and leverage this information. The Sunlight Foundation created Apps for America, a competition to create innovative uses of this data. An example is Flyontime.us - using DOT data to track the timeliness of air flights.

The Patent and Trademark office and the GAO were cited as exemplary in the use of broadband: 50% of PTO and GAO employees telecommute.

Graham Richards, the former mayor of Fort Wayne (IN), described his efforts to transform Fort Wayne into a smart city, especially after the loss of jobs from both General Electric and International Harvester. The city recognized that education was key, and committed to making sure that Fort Wayne had quality jobs, and was safe. The city added broadband to the city's infrastructure matrix, and realized that major investments were needed. Technology is now included in every city project. Richards said that as a result, Fort Wayne has realized more than $31 million in savings due to more efficient ways of doing business.

Richards organized teams to create innovative uses of technology in city services. He cited the health department's use of electronic medical records and a new digital literacy program called Senior Connect, matching high school students with the elderly. Housing revitalization now includes fiber broadband connections. People are encouraged to use technology for energy efficiency -- Smart homes - to create green communities. The police department is using technology to fight crime; robotics technology enables better safety for bomb squads.

Richards ended by encouraging greater collaboration among government agencies; making the FCC web site as dynamic and interactive as possible; and create a national clearinghouse to showcase innovative success stories or best practices. The goal of this third recommendation is to share best practices.

Beth Noveck, the Federal Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Open Government, began by stating that broadband is the platform that allows government to tap into the experience of ordinary Americans. She said that the current era has the necessary technology available to achieve open government. Collaboration, she said, is the key to effective civic engagement.
Novaxck described the 3 phases of the Open Government Policy process:

• Dialogue/brainstorming online
• OSTP Blog facilitated discussion online
• Recommendations; use of w wiki enables participation in formulating recommendations online.

The second panel was on civic engagement from the view of the non-profit sector. Norm Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research noted that our society is moving onto the Internet. He said the challenge before us is creating a vibrant public square - a viable public forum that allows citizens to learn about and interact with their government, to communicate and debate ideas - in this new environment. He warned that, looking ahead, citizens who do not have robust, affordable broadband access will be shut out of the debate.

Ornstein also spoke about the future of campaign financing. He admitted that political campaigns still communicate mainly through television ads, but that that is changing. Over time, more and more political communication will happen over the Internet. He warned that the Supreme Court, at the very least, is slowly chipping away at the current regulation of campaign finance and that that there is a real chance the current regulations could be completely overturned this year - it could mean completely lifting restrictions on corporate-funded political speech. So, what will the next generation of campaign fiancé be? He pointed positively at the Obama '08 campaign which mobilized a large group of small donors and credited a real online community.

Andrew Rasiej of the Personal Democracy Forum discussed innovative uses of broadband that enhance democracy. He noted that campaign-produced videos were viewed over 150 million times on YouTube. Citizen-generated videos, however, were viewed 1.3 billion times. He said that the discussions that used to take place at the office water cooler, over the back fence or at the family dinner table are now taking place online. The Internet, he said, is allowing Americans to continue the tradition of being political pamphleteers.

In an age in which we're losing metro sections in local papers, what's needed is machine readabale, searchable, online information and data. Additionally, schools must strive to have the around-the-clock connectiveness to students, parents and the community that is now standard for Fortune 500 companies.

Rutgers 's Ellen Goodman spoke to the role of public media in information creation, curation and connection, providing examples of current projects that engage and empower citizens and potential advances that could more powerfully connect people to information. The idea is to 1) create trusted journalism 2) drive traffic to quality content 3) connect technology to expression to action; to connect citizens to eachother, to services, to information; and to connect to reporting of local and global issues

During a Question and Answer period, a FCC staffer asked what panelists could predict for the next 12 months or so concerning a national virtual public square -- what should the Commission be thinking about?
Ornstein answered that people are cocooning more and more - there's less real public debate because people get more info that merely reinforces what they already believed. What's needed is innovation to get back to truly public forum that allows access to common facts for arguments.

When asked for examples of shining examples of the Internet and technology improving citizen engagement, Rasiej pointed to the recent uprising in Iran.

Rasiej said he believes that organized minorities trump unorganized majorities all the time. The Internet, he said, allows minorities to organize.

John Wonderlich of the Sunlight Foundation suggested that citizens find out what's going on near you and who represents you. Ask what is know-able in this space? He also suggested becoming technology-competent. The first blog post, etc is big step -- it will become easier.