Broadband – the World’S Newest Public Utility
City of New Orleans Broadband – the World’s Newest Public Utility Making the Case for Public Sector Involvement in Expanding Broadband Access Author - Jennifer Terry December 9, 2014 1 2 Acknowledgments This report was prepared for the City of New Orleans under the auspices of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2) Fellowship program. During my two-year fellowship, I worked with staff in the City’s Department of Information Technology and Innovation to develop a long-term Broadband Master Plan for the City. Pursuant to that project, I conducted research into the importance of broadband, reasons why people lack broadband access, and possible strategies to help bring broadband to people who currently do not have it. This report, along with the companion report, “Broadband Around the World: Best Practices and Lessons Learned from Other Jurisdictions,” documents the research findings. I would like to thank my colleagues at the City of New Orleans for their assistance during this process. The people who selflessly shared relevant information and willingly served as sounding boards for ideas are too numerous to name. I also want to thank the SC2 Fellowship Management team for their assistance in framing the research and for keeping me on task to completion. Sincerely, Jennifer 3 4 Foreword As of August 29, 2013, in one second on the internet, there were approximately 200 Reddit votes casted, 500 Instagram photos uploaded, 900 Tumblr posts posted, 1,050 Skype calls connected, 5,000 tweets tweeted, 10,000 files uploaded to Dropbox, 30,000 Google searches, 55,000 YouTube videos viewed and Facebook likes, and multiple billions of emails written and sent.1 Undoubtedly, these numbers are horribly out of date as you read this document.
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