Navigating Local Broadband Why its worth it for your community

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Navigating Local BroadbandWhy its worth it for
your community!

• Tanesha Hixon,Office of Technology Partnerships
• Michigan Department of Information Technology

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Can you Imagine

• Your community without highways, expressways or
  even
• electricity?.....
• The introduction of these new inventions changed
  everything. Its now easy to see the positive
  impact of them, but at the time people were weary
  and thought these inventions were strange and
  unnecessary.
• Broadband can have the same impact on your
  community as these now necessities. The need for
  broadband is real.

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Broadband for your communityis not only
possibleits critical

• Broadband is helping communities of all sizes
  and needs
• Promote Economic Development
• Better Education
• Improve Government
• Increase Tourism
• Enhance Healthcare
• Equip First Responders

How are others navigating this road?
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Benefits of BroadbandEconomic development

• Princeton, IL (Pop. 8,000) learned their lesson
  the hard way
• Due to the lack of broadband services, their
  largest employer left town, taking 450 jobs
• Due to the installation of broadband, the second
  largest employer decided to stay!

Why are businesses demanding broadband?
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Broadband makes business cents!

• A recent survey of remote and rural broadband
  networks in British Columbia found
• 62 attribute increased productivity to
  broadband most saw at least a 10 rise
• 80 believe that not having broadband would
  negatively impact their business
• 18 believe they could not operate their
  business without it!

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Up with efficiency down with business costs

• Broadband provides a new way to cut costs, win
  new business and compete globally
• Connectivity is also reported to increase
  revenue

Efficiency
It also makes sense for education
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Benefits of BroadbandBetter education

• We could learn a few things from rural Pickens
  County, GA (Pops. lt3,500)
• None of the countys schools had the resources to
  hire a foreign language teacher. After installing
  broadband that connected their four schools they
  were able to hire one teacher to teach for all
  four schools at the same time using full motion
  video equipment
• Saved 140,000/year after all expenses for the
  equipment!!

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Improve governmentReduce costs!

• Increase efficiency and cost effectiveness
• Faster, better quality service for less!!
• Make government services readily available and
  enable resident self service reducing
  administrative costs!
• Residents can
• Have 24x7 access to services and information
• Handle affairs on their own time! No more
  taking off work to stand in line

Pickens County, GA also Added broadband in
their county courthouse and jail for additional
cost savings through video arraignment and
telemedicine!!
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More employees for businesses More jobs for
residents

• Communities in ME and KY are already benefiting
  from broadband and telecommuting
• In 12 months, a small company in Maine has grown
  from a small office of four employees to a
  national network of over 50 workers that work
  from their homes using broadband
• In 18 months, Kentuckys partial broadband
  services deployment has added 25,300 new jobs
  full-scale deployment is projected to add more
  than 5 million to the Gross State Product

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Benefits of BroadbandPromoting Tourism

• Broadband connectivity is becoming a necessity
  to the hospitality industry
• More than 40 of business travelers80 of
  extended stay guestswant access to broadband
• Internet access in coffee shops, hotels and
  airports is becoming an expected amenity

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The tourist trap of the 21st Century!

• Broadband was a worthy tourism investment for
  Stevenson, WA (Pop. 1,300)
• Known for logging, world-class fishing and salmon
  runs, Stevenson used tourism funds to invest in
  WiFi
• Launched in Oct. 2003, the network blankets the
  downtown, Fair Grounds and adjoining recreation
  area
• Guests may log in for an hour at a time, but
  first go through a Welcome to Stevenson page,
  with city amenities and services promotions
• Local businesses have noticed an increase in the
  length of overnight stays and in business overall

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Benefits of BroadbandEnhancing healthcare
reducing costs

• Broadband-enabled telemedicine is improving the
  quality of care and reducing cost, time and
  travel
• Rural hospitals can treat patients with
  consultation from external specialists
• Small health care clinics can work with larger
  facilities to process test and lab results faster
• Patients do not need to travel great distances to
  access to Doctors, whocan now make a diagnosis
  remotely

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Benefits of BroadbandEquipping first responders

• Broadband is providing life-saving data and
  communication access to police and firefighters
• Broadband-based voice and datacommunication
  improves response time and costs less
• It is also much more reliable

Hurricane Katrina taught us the value of
broadband During and after the storm, 38
Public Safety Answering Points failed, thousands
were without access to emergency
operatorsHardier IP networks would have
prevented this!
So, have you heard enough?
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Ready for Action?Bringing Broadband to your
community

• Next Steps
• Check with neighboring communities with broadband
  for help and lessons learned
• Learn from other Michigan communities
• Washtenaw County
• Oakland County
• City of Grand Rapids
• Genesee County
• Obtain MDITs Broadband in Action Plan

We can help
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Contacts Questions

• MDIT Office of Technology Partnerships
• George Boersma, Directorboersmag_at_michigan.gov
  [phone]
• Tanesha Hixonhixont_at_michigan.gov [phone]