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San Joaquin Valley ACCESS:
Bridging the Rural Divide on a Regional Scale
Seth Fearey, Connected Communities
A version of this paper was published by the Benton
Foundation’s
Digital Divide Network on July 1, 2002.
California’s San Joaquin Valley is tackling the rural digital divide
on a breathtaking scale. About 1,000 people in nine counties participated
in one way or another. Over 400 people shared their ideas at series of
workshops and developed 59 projects to help the Valley’s large and
diverse population get better connections and put the network to
more productive use. Because of the strong emphasis on developing local
leadership and projects that meet local needs, we believe the
program will sustain itself for several years.
The San Joaquin Valley, America’s Fruit and Vegetable Basket
The Valley’s 12,000 square miles comprise the most productive
agricultural region in the world in dollar terms. Over 350 crops are grown
here, including tomatoes, grapes, almonds, cotton, and lemons, plus
poultry and dairy products. Food processors add value to local crops and
sell worldwide. One million of the Valley’s 3.4 million residents live
outside of the 62 incorporated cities. The median incorporated city has a
population of about 13,000.
Like many rural communities, the region’s economy has been weak for
many years. Unemployment hovered around 14% during the peak of the 1990’s
boom. In 1997, the median household income ranged from $24,000 to $31,000
per year vs. the average in California of $36,000. Sixty-six percent of
residents under age 25 have a high school diploma vs. 76% for the entire
state.
The Valley’s population is young and growing rapidly. Over the next
40 years the Valley is projected to add 10 million people, most of them
born locally. The low cost of housing attracts workers from Silicon
Valley, Sacramento, and Los Angeles County who put up with remarkably long
commutes.
The Valley’s Digital Divide
In April 2002, as part of an annual survey of the Central Valley, the
Public Policy Institute of California asked questions on computer and
Internet use. It found a substantial gap between the San Joaquin Valley
and the Sacramento region:
| |
SJ Valley |
Sacramento |
|
Use a computer at home, work or school |
71% |
83% |
|
Have gone on-line to use the Web or e-mail |
61%-63% |
77% |
The Institute also found a 17-point gap in Internet use between Latinos
and non-Hispanic whites living in the Valley, but this appears to be
income related. Usage levels for computers and the Internet are the same
for both groups when they earn over $40,000 per year.
In many rural areas the quality of telephone lines is poor. Top speeds
for data lines are often less than 28.8 kbps, and rain can shut down data
service entirely.
Providing Regional Leadership
The Great Valley Center is a private, non-profit, non-partisan
organization committed to building support for California's Great Central
Valley as a distinct region. Carol Whiteside, the Center’s president,
believes the Valley’s economy has to diversify if it is going to reduce
unemployment, accommodate population growth and compete in the new, global
economy. Most Valley residents want to preserve the region’s
agricultural industry and heritage, but they know they also have to
attract and develop more manufacturing and professional service jobs to
employ all the new residents.
In Connecting to Compete in the New Economy, a report released
in August 2000, the Center announced that the San Joaquin Valley needs a
reliable, affordable, and ubiquitous, high-speed information
infrastructure to attract and support high-wage employers. To improve
connectivity, the Center created ACCESS, Advanced Communications
Connectivity for E-Commerce Strategic Success. ACCESS is a partnership
program of the Great Valley Center and the California Technology, Trade
& Commerce Agency, Division of Science, Technology & Innovation.
Participating counties match the Agency’s funding with in-kind support.
Developing a Plan and Leadership Structure
The Great Valley Center worked with Connected Communities to create a
process for improving connectivity that combines community leadership with
market forces. Based on experience with several other communities, the
process has three phases:
- Conduct community assessments
- Develop ideas for action initiatives
- Implement the best ideas
To start the program we had to win the support of the county Chief
Information Officers (CIO’s). They quickly grasped the technical vision
but worried that they did not know enough about economic development. To
address this need, each county created a 10-15 member steering committee
with economic development professionals, county supervisors, and leaders
from each economic sector.
The ACCESS program reports to a regional leadership organization, the
San Joaquin Valley Broadband Task Force (BBTF). The BBTF currently has 30
members including all nine county CIOs, economic development
professionals, several county supervisors, communications companies, K-12
education leaders, and representatives of the University of California and
California State University. At quarterly meetings, Task Force members
review the direction and progress of the program, share experiences, and
learn about new technologies and projects in other parts of the country.
Phase I – Conduct community self-assessments
The next step was to conduct readiness
assessments in each county. We chose the Computer Systems Policy Project Readiness
Guide for Living in the Networked World as our framework. The Guide
looks at 23 indicators in the following five categories:
 | The Network |
| Networked Places |
| Networked Applications & Services |
| Networked Economy |
| Networked World Enablers |
Each county’s steering
committee invited 50 to 120 leaders from the key economic sectors –
education, business, agriculture, telecommunications, government,
healthcare, and community based organizations – to participate in
half-day self-assessment workshops. Workshop participants rated their
sectors according to four stages:
Stage 1 – dial up
connectivity, some use of e-mail and the web
Stage 2 – some use of
broadband and e-commerce technologies
Stage 3 – wide-spread use
of broadband and e-commerce technologies
Stage 4 – full
integration of the network into everyday work and life
The results in each county were unique, but two
findings applied across the Valley:
 | Connectivity was good in the larger cities, but only a few
businesses, government agencies, or non-profits in those cities were
putting the network to productive use. For many organizations, the
benefits of high-speed services did not appear to be worth the cost. |
| Outside of the larger cities, access to affordable, high-speed
services was generally non-existent. High-speed services like T1 and
T3 could be purchased, but rates were high, and customers often had to
pay the full cost of construction. This was a major problem for
growers, small businesses, and people trying to telecommute. |
Phase II – Develop ideas for action initiatives
In each county, the steering committee identified four sector teams to
brainstorm ideas for how the sector could advance to the next stage of
readiness. Connected Communities facilitated the meetings, drawing out
ideas for how to improve the communications infrastructure and create
compelling applications with local value.
As of June 2002, eight of the nine counties
have completed the process, yielding 59 documented project ideas. The
following are a few examples:
| Provide e-commerce classes for growers, taught by growers with the
help of the local community colleges. |
| Put pesticide and burn permit applications on the agriculture
commission website. |
| Identify all towers over 100 feet tall and develop policies to
encourage tower sharing for wireless data services. |
| Get refurbished computers into the homes of low-income families to
help parents communicate with their children’s teachers and
schools. |
| Network social services agencies’ databases – government and
non-profit – to reduce the duplication of files and improve client
service. |
| Create internship programs to help students get real-world
experience developing e-commerce websites for local small
businesses. |
Most of the telephone companies, including Ponderosa Telephone, Sierra
Tel and SBC Pacific Bell, were valuable contributors to the program. We
had less success attracting the participation of AT&T and the other
cable companies.
Phase III – Implement the best ideas
The state provided funding for Phase I and II of the rural e-commerce
program. Now
community leadership has to take over. Each of the projects has to find
its own funding, but many projects do not need money or just require a
change in priorities for existing budgets.
The county level steering committees will continue to meet to monitor
progress and identify new opportunities. We are asking the local economic
development organizations play a stronger role in providing on-going
leadership. If we have done our job well, the teams that developed the
action initiatives will follow through with implementation.
To support the continuation of the program, the Great Valley Center is
incubating the San Joaquin Valley Communications Leadership and
Information Center (CLIC), a new organization that will act as a central
storehouse of telecommunications expertise. Initial funding comes from the
U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Community Technology Foundation, and
the Governor’s 2001-2002 Workforce Investment Act 15% discretionary
fund.
Results to Date, Next Steps
Working on a scale as large as the San Joaquin Valley may seem like
folly, but there is tremendous power in teamwork and competitive spirit.
It is remarkable that so many highly qualified people contributed their
time and expertise at so many meetings. The 59 ideas are all of high
quality. Some may fail, but many will succeed and pave the way for new
projects. The key to success is using local leadership to identify
and address local needs. The Internet makes it much easier to
connect to the world, but for the great majority of people it is still the
local community that matters most.
Since we started the program, access to affordable high-speed services
has improved. Sierra Tel and MercedNet, for example, launched high-speed
wireless services that use the new Multi-channel Multi-point Distribution
Services (MMDS) and Local Multi-point Distribution Services (LMDS)
technologies. SBC Pacific Bell extended its DSL coverage to include more
neighborhoods, and cable modem service availability has grown. But we
still have a long way to go.
We are now starting work on ACCESS II – identifying opportunities for
initiatives that span all nine counties. We are looking into projects such
as regional Geographic Information Systems (GIS), public policy models,
information literacy programs, an e-commerce seminar series, and on-line
tools for economic development and business licensing.
For more information on the ACCESS program,
partners, and tools, visit the following links.
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