Oakland Program Empowers Groups to Tackle Digital Divide

Ten organizations receiving funding through The Town Link, a program that aims to improve digital equity in Oakland (CA) will be offering various trainings over the next year to improve digital inclusion and literacy within their communities. The organizations will each receive $10,000 to inform residents about affordable broadband plans, pay for computers and tablets, and then teach them the necessary skills to use those devices. The campaigns are to be complete by fall 2022. The move to launch this program followed the publication of a report on digital equity in the city by The Greenlining Institute, which compared how the communities in and near the city that lack high-speed Internet access resemble the official redlining maps from the 1930s. According to Vinhcent Le, legal counsel with The Greenlining Institute’s economic equity team, the criteria requires that organizations be Oakland-based and serve priority communities as identified by American Community Survey census data. While this program will only last a year, Le said that the plan is to share the approach and what is learned so that it can potentially be replicated in other localities. Other cities have already displayed interest in launching similar programs, Le said, and there is the potential of using federal funding opportunities to help them do so.