At the inaugural, virtual meeting on Monday of the Closing the Digital Divide Task Force on Facebook Live, state Assembly and Senate members from Chino to Inglewood to Winters heard from representatives of Amazon, AT&T, Charter Communications Inc., Comcast, Cox Communications Inc., Verizon and the California Public Utilities Commission about what they have done to help connect the one in five California children who lack connectivity or a device for remote learning. The task force will meet again next week, said Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, its co-chairman. Among the takeaways:
• Internet service providers (ISPs) on the call recounted a plethora of low-cost Internet services available to students and low-income families that in many cases existed before the pandemic, but which have been expanded since mid-March. AT&T’s contributions include a $300,000 donation for Chromebooks; $250,000 for online learning programming; $10 monthly Internet access for low- or limited-income households – expanding to those participating in the National School Lunch and Headstart programs; and options for 60 days' free service during the crisis, said Susan Santana, its vice president for California legislative affairs. Charter Communications Inc.’s offerings include 60 days of free Spectrum broadband and Wi-Fi access to households with lower education or college students, said Keri Askew Bailey, its regional vice president for state government affairs. Since March 13, Comcast has offered residents two free months of Internet for new subscribers; raised speeds from 15/2 MBPS to 25/3; and is partnering with school districts on sponsored services for their students, company representatives told lawmakers. Cox’s Connect2Compete program targets the crisis specifically, offering low-income customers who sign up from March 13 to May 15 for free service through July 15 and charges of $9.95 per month thereafter, said Chanelle Hawken, its vice president for government and public affairs. The program also offers resources for discounted refurbished equipment through its association with PCs for People, and a Learn from Home toolkit for schools. Verizon has created education-specific rate plans for school districts during the crisis; amended its commercial contract with Los Angeles Unified School District to enable Internet access for 100,000 students who lack it; and is working with the California Department of Education and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office on options for discounted unlimited services to up to 250,000 students statewide, said its California vice president of public policy and legal affairs.
• Company representatives generally said they don’t require residents to provide a credit card or Social Security number to sign up for service, and that alternate forms of identification may be used, in response to a question from the task force. On its plans to expand service in rural or frontier communities, Santana said AT&T has invested more than $8 billion during the past three years in wired and wireless technology in California. It will build out advanced broadband services to 141,000 remote and hard-to-reach locations in the state this year. Askew Bailey said Charter has focused grant funding on three “relatively small” Southern California projects bringing broadband to 179 households, but it’s part of a larger expansion of broadband to 70,000 households that dates to 2016.
Asked whether Comcast would be willing to supply COWs (cells on wheels) or trailers to rural areas like Butte County, a company rep said Comcast does deploy its Wi-Fi on Wheels (WOW) van but this still needs proximity to its network. Cox, which covers southern Orange and San Diego counties as well as Palos Verdes and Santa Barbara, doesn’t have a great deal of rural area in its footprint, Hawken said, but it offers gigabit Internet speeds to everyone in its network. Verizon has good coverage in Butte County, its representative said, but the company would be willing to consider offering COWs.
• Lawmakers in remote or low-income areas questioned whether their providers have actually done enough to connect residents and if the pandemic will really galvanize change. State Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, praised Santana but said: “If you take a look, in particular on the north coast in Northern California, the only dollars truly that are being spent by AT&T are the Connect America funds – taxpayer dollars that are subsidizing hookups.” McGuire said he and Assemblymember Jim Wood, D-Santa Rosa, grapple with the fact that there’s only one fiber line between Mendocino and Del Norte counties. Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, D-Winters, agreed with their comments and asked for a sense of how many customers have signed up since Newsom’s March 19 stay-at-home order, and how AT&T will track whether that’s been for education.
Santana told Aguiar-Curry she’d commit “to getting you at least a ballpark figure” and to working with McGuire’s office “to get to the bottom of those numbers” and identify any other barriers. “AT&T, just as all the other carriers, I’m sure, are extremely committed to the buildout. Because if it’s not the pandemic, it’s the wildfires, right? And so, we’re also planning for the future,” she said.
Thurmond said there’s no question the issue needs more work, emphasizing: “We are saying, now, it’s time to move with urgency to close the gap on some of those issues in the rural communities.”
• Others said more needs to be done to publicize the free or low-cost services available to families with school-age children. Hawken said Cox has “literally shipped” some of its promotional materials to schools where people pick up food.
“I think you do have to look at a lot of different ways to communicate," said Assemblymember Autumn Burke, D-Inglewood. "Where people are picking up their free lunches is an ideal place.” Thurmond secured initial pledges from ISPs to a fund underwriting better communication to families on service offerings and to work with the task force.
