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I would recommend that you check out AC4, the Association for Christian Computing Centers, also known as TechMission. I used to work for one of their secular partners, CTCNet which does similar things but for community- as opposed to church-oriented sites.

If you'd like to see how we've been doing things for the past couple of years, check out our website at NPOTechs.org.

And good luck!

WIRES?

We are talking about FREE broadband to a government subsidized facility.

No. We are talking about making further use of infrastructure that is already in place. if it's at all available, business offices are already going to have broadband.

And again you entirely miss the "free" part. If you are working to sustain an infrastructure, how the fuck is it "free?" Are the vegetables from my garden "free" because they "just sprang up from the ground?" Does my time not count because I am not on a corporate payroll? Does theirs not count because they are working for their community instead of AOL?

Be informed.

Our current focus is at New Englewood Terrace (NET), a 23 story, 303 unit development in the Englewood community in southwestern Chicago. We are about to close and start the redevelopment program. Our goal is to use NET as an "idea" building, to illustrate the values to residents of service enriched housing, neighborhood connections, and the potentials of smart buildings and neighborhoods.

Bringing broadband to the building makes many things possible. Through the combination of vertical fiber, horizontal ethernet and wireless access points (WAPs), every unit/room at NET can have wireless broadband access to the Internet. Cisco Fellows have been key advisers. The broadband connection can also be helpful with building operating economics: replacing guards in part with surveillance equipment, optimizing energy costs, sensing, regulating and monitoring devices, etc.

Motorola has developed a series of Canopy products which allow NET to access a wireless broadband signal from up to 20 miles, distribute it within the building (via wires, wires/wireless, and wireless technologies), and through a smart antenna to distribute the signal for up to 2 miles from the building (where it can be further extended by wireless applications among buildings, and with wifi technoligies within buildings.

There are two remaining parts to our overall program. The first is to develop a neighborhood oriented ISP to provide connectivity to the system and all of the other provisioning, billing and service requirements. The second is to make sure that content is available that is relevant and meaningful to the interests of NET and Englewood customers. Some important research has been done in this area by the Children's Partnership and Contentbank.org.

Our perspective on the needs of neighborhood technology networks is shaped by the history of DSSA in government housing. In could just as easily come from a school, a library, a church, a community media center, a CTC or a community network. But it is important to note that there are 50,000 government housing projects in the U.S., 5,000,000 units of housing, 17,500,000 residents, in neighborhoods of 60,000,000. Service enriched and technology supported government housing developments could be important parts of any community network.

The Community Technology Centers Network (CTCNet) is a national non-profit membership organization of more than one thousand community technology centers. Its web site and membership has advice on what to do -- and what not to do -- in a community computer lab.

The article lists several more sources for information:

• Warschauer, Mark. Technology and Social Inclusion: Rethinking the Digital Divide. Boston: MIT Press. 2003.
• Becker, Henry J. Who's Wired and Who's not? The Future of Children Vol 10 No 2; 2000.
• Warschauer, Mark. Reconceptualizing the Digital Divide. First Monday Vol 7 no 7; 2002.
• Athena Alliance
• Center for Scoial Informatics
• Community Informatics Research and Applications Unit
• Community Technology Centers Network
• Digital Divide Network

the PowerUP national program didn't survive because it was a top-down, corporate driven response to the Digital Divide. It was doomed from the beginning. all of the PowerUP sites in communities are continuing, but are being run by more grass-roots organizations, such as CTCNet, a very successful grassroots Digital Divide effort, and Big Brothers Big Sisters.

I strongly suggest you -- and anyone who wants to engage in a community tech initiative -- contact the folks at CTCNet; they should have some excellent guidance on forming a community/nonprofit LAN.

Here are assorted Web sites of members of the Community Technology Centers Network (CTCNet). And there's a complete directory of the Network's 650+ member organizations at a href=http://www2.ctcnet.org/ctc.asp">http://www 2.ctcnet.org/ctc.asp Most of those centers would love to get more volunteers with good tech skills since their budgets are usually pretty tight. Some are full-fledged community networks, others mainly provide skills-building opportunities for people in the neighborhood. -S.

Here are assorted Web sites of members of the Community Technology Centers Network (CTCNet). And there's a complete directory of the Network's 650+ member organizations at a href=http://www2.ctcnet.org/ctc.asp">http://www 2.ctcnet.org/ctc.asp Most of those centers would love to get more volunteers with good tech skills since their budgets are usually pretty tight. Some are full-fledged community networks, others mainly provide skills-building opportunities for people in the neighborhood. -S.

In low-income communities where can people no longer in school go to acquire computer skills? Well, they can go on the 'net or over to a buddy's place, of course. But also, in lots of neighborhoods, community technology centers are being established... places where people can take an inexpensive class or just hang out during open access hours trying things out and sharing what they learn. Many of these places could use funds, but just as much they can use volunteer talent. There's a list of hundreds of them at http://www.ctcnet.org. That's the site of the Community Technology Centers' Network (CTCNet). CTCNet, itself, is thinking it'd like to set up a slashdot-like environment for focus on community technology issues. If you could advise CTCNet staff (hey, that's me) try to set that up, boy would it be appreciated! Write info@ctcnet.org if you think you might be able to offer help! Steve Ronan