- Details
- By Chez Oxendine
- Economic Development
$1,230,457.05
Project Summary: This dual Broadband Use and Adoption and Planning, Engineering, Feasibility, and Sustainability project will address broadband network issues of the Tribe. The Broadband Use and Adoption portion will implement a project that supports digital inclusion efforts and procures broadband equipment and services for Tribal members. The Planning Study component aims to produce a plan for future broadband infrastructure projects across the Rincon Reservation.
Update: The award has funded two broad projects: improving use and adoption rates in the short term among existing served customers while also conducting a feasibility study to inform future efforts.
For the former goal, the Tribe is in the process of hiring a contractor and advocate for their digital inclusion plan, aiming to develop an “ecosystem” for training and improving digital literacy. For the latter, the Tribe is searching for a project manager and conducting regional mapping to improve its broadband infrastructure deployment plan.
Chairman Bo Mazetti called the Tribe’s activities necessary amid the needs and issues exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, such as lacking telehealth, telework, and distance learning services.
“There’s a move toward trying to increase broadband services on the national level,” Mazzetti said. “It’s a pretty major service for everyone.”
In addition to building digital literacy through their TBCP award, the Tribe has embarked on a fiber deployment project through a private partnership with telecom AT&T, who will help bring fiber connections to 400 homes on the reservation. That’s in addition to the Connected Learning Center, also built in partnership with AT&T, which provides free access to computers and digital resources on the Rincon Reservation.
“This is an absolute dream come true for our seniors, youth and the many tribal members who for many years did not have access to technology for the use of gathering information,” Mazetti told the San Diego Business Journal in a March 9 report. “This center will now enable our tribal members… to have limitless learning and exciting possibilities through the power of technology.”
