Government Technology

How Telehealth and Telehealth Access Points Drive Broadband Adoption

What can make people enthusiastic about broadband? What if a community, using the creation orientation, views broadband as the means to build or invent things that didn’t exist before? Essential Families is a 501c3 nonprofit that provides virtual parental education and mental healthcare services. The organization conducted a telehealth pilot in one of the poorest communities in Kansas City (MO) with stellar results.

State Governments Continue to Add Digital Equity Staff

A  wave of states has recently created new full-time positions to work on digital inclusion and digital equity.

Connect99: Birmingham, Alabama Takes Aim at the Digital Divide

The Connect99 initiative aims to address the digital divide in Birmingham (AL) by providing residents with affordable internet access.

Digital Equity Is Having a Moment. What Happens When It Ends?

Digital equity is having a moment, but what happens when that moment ends? Angela Siefer, Executive Director of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA), asked, “How do we keep this going?” The answer, Siefer said, is to figure out what the work needs to live on, specifically how practitioners can create “sustained, robust digital inclusion ecosystems in every community.” Digital inclusion ecosystems is a concept that the NDIA has already defined—a digital inclusion ecosystem is “a combination of programs and policies that meet a geographic community’s unique and diverse needs, where

Kansas Gets $15 Million in Digital Equity Funds from Treasury

The US Treasury Department awarded Kansas $15 million for digital equity work, with the money going toward public Wi-Fi, digital skills training, and more. In addition, 20 other states have applied for digital equity funding from the same source, with other awards expected to be made soon. “Kansas is just the first of many more to come,” said Joseph Wender director of the Treasury Department's Capital Projects Fund (CPF), which is part of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).

State of the States 2023: Putting Numbers to Broadband

Without a record to point to yet, addresses from new governors tend to be light on details as they grapple with forming their cabinets, articulating policy priorities, confronting economic realities, and delving into budget details.