Digital Equity Funding I Highlight on past TMF winners I Dreaming Black Futures

City of Seattle, Washington sent this bulletin at 08/16/2022 02:32 PM PDT
Seattle IT logo large
photo of people standing in front of a solid ground truck

Another Digital Equity project receives funding!

Solid Ground will receive sponsorship for their digital equity project. Verizon has agreed to fund their project for core wireless infrastructure across two housing sites and their main office. This is in addition to the $590,000 in grants to Technology Matching Fund projects and Digital Navigator Cohorts.

This project will increase WiFi access for up to 800 residents and community members formerly experiencing homelessness and living on low incomes. This partnership with Verizon will allow Wireless Access Points to be installed in five buildings at Solid Ground’s Sand Point campus, Broadview shelter and transitional housing, and in the lobby of their main office in Wallingford. This will support community members to give consistent, stable WiFi access. Solid Ground will also install a video conferencing system at the Wallingford office to enable remote case management services.    

To view the full list of recipients of Digital Equity grants, read our City of Seattle announces 2022 Digital Equity Grant winners blog post.

 

Family Digital Navigators help Yesler residents thrive with technology

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the Multimedia Resources and Training Institute (MMRTI) created a Family Digital Navigators Program that hired and trained local students to help the Yesler community progress towards digital equity. The MMRTI Navigators work closely with Yesler residents to help them better learn and be able to participate in the evolving digital world. This work helps families with limited or no access to the internet, who lack the experience to do activities such as e-learning, homework, depositing a check, looking for jobs, applying for benefits, and other critical activities online. Read more here...

City of Seattle wins Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) award

The City of Seattle has been recognized as a 2022 EPEAT Purchaser Award winner, which celebrates leaders in sustainable electronics procurement. The award comes from the Global Electronics Council (GEC), the non-profit organization that manages the EPEAT ecolabel. EPEAT allows City of Seattle to efficiently address the lifecycle impacts of the electronics we purchase, including computers, displays, printers, copiers, network equipment, mobile phones, servers, photovoltaic modules, inverters, and televisions. The sustainability impact is a cost savings of $178,962 annually.

Sustainability impact cost savings

Dreaming Black Futures

Dreaming Black Futures collage

This past February, Seattle IT partnered with Black multi-disciplinary artists and technologists, Mia Imani and Kadallah Burrowes, to center not only Black History Month, but tap into our imagination for Black Futures Month.

The “Dreaming Black Futures” program shared with employees of the City of Seattle and King County, inclusive of an illuminating lecture on Afrofuturism, and workshops for City of Seattle employees on ‘Afrofuturism in Waking Life,’ and ‘Dreaming as an Active Practice.’ 

Read this blog post to listen to the Dreaming Black Future lecture and to explore the videos clips from a companion symposium and Dreaming affirmations.