Broadband Roll-Out That Excludes Communities is "Prescription for Disaster"

At the Federal Communications Commission's National broadband Plan field hearing in Charleston (SC), Alliance for Digital Equality (ADE) founder Julius Hollis told Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Michael Copps that if the broadband revolution excludes any community, "none of us will be safe in this world." He called it a "prescription for disaster in which America will implode." ADE advocates for equal access to technology in underserved communities. Its partners include BET, AT&T, and wireless provider Qualcomm. Hollis said bridging that divide would take public/private partnerships, echoing a theme of the hearing, which was that neither government nor the private sector could do it alone. Bernie Mazyck, president and CEO of the South Carolina Association of Community Development Corporations, said that the FCC needed to insure organizations like his had a seat at the table, adding that a strictly marketplace-based approach was not the answer.