With all the great community broadband network projects out there that are owned by local governments, I hope readers will take some time to nominate some of them for the "Innovations in American Government" awards from the Ash Center at Harvard's Kennedy School.
Deadline for nominations is March 1.
Winners of the Innovations competition are eligible for awards of up to $100,000 for replication and dissemination. You may apply directly or you can be referred through an adviser to the program, which assures that program staff will follow up with you to make sure you are eligible and that you successfully complete the application.
Santa Monica won this award last September.
Is subscription sales the only way our municipality is going to see a return on our $500,000 [city-owned wireless network]? Not really. We see other benefits. Police on the street longer because they can do their reports from the cars rather than the squad room. More information to our firefighters before they make scene on a possible structure fire. AMR project. Tourist access to city wide internet. These are all hard dollar and soft dollar returns that are real.
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