Today on the podcast we welcome Angela Siefer and Craig Settles. Angela is the founder and Executive Director of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance, and a tireless digital equity and inclusion advocate whose has worked to connect communities for over two decades. Craig is a nationally recognized consultant who works with public- and private-sector clients to build and improve networks. He hosts Gigabit Nation and is the President of Communities United for Broadband.
Together, Christopher, Angela, and Craig untangle the long history of broadband subsidies and racial bias, and how that has come to influence who has affordable connection options today. They also talk about the current stage of telehealth and the ramifications of the Digital Equity Act since its adoption a year ago. Angela highlights the importance of having state digital equity plans to address unequal access in anticipation of disbursing funds to close the digital divide during the pandemic. The group also talks about the costs of not being connected — in healthcare, in employment searches and job training, and in k-12 education — and how to make sure that both rural and urban broadband plans address everyone who lives there.
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Transcript coming soon.
This show is 46 minutes long and can be played on this page or via iTunes or the tool of your choice using this feed. You can listen to the interview on this page or visit the Community Broadband Bits page.
Listen to other episodes here or view all episodes in our index.
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Thanks to Arne Huseby for the music. The song is Warm Duck Shuffle and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Image via iStock.com/SDI Productions
This article was originally published on ILSR’s MuniNetworks.org. Read the original here.
