Greetings, everybody. Glad to see you all again. Glad you could join us and want to go ahead and get started. Hopefully we'll have a good meeting today. So let me get to the agenda here. So as always, I want to thank our sponsors CareFirst healthplan. Valley, the sun, United Way satellite broadcasting, communications Kajeet. And you're going to hear from the Kajeet with from Ryan just a little while. triad wireless, and Karen Ziegler consulting services. So that's it. Do we have I think several new people this morning, or this afternoon, Ryan, we're going to hear you're going to introduce yourself later. But let's see who we got here. Amber, I think your this is your first time being here, aren't you?
Yes, it is.
So you want to introduce yourself? Amber.
Hi, my name is Amber Wells. I'm from the Pima County community and Workforce Development Department down here in Tucson. And I am the program coordinator for Virtual Engagement.
Okay, great. Thanks, Amber. Glad you're joining us today. I'm Scott Scott. Carrie. Carrie, scary. I'm a telecom manager for a Horrocks engineering firm here in Arizona. We actually have a presence in other states as well. And when companies Ascot Clorox and anybody else who's new to us today,
yes,
this is this is better. Petra Falcon in Phoenix, Arizona, Executive Director, Promise, Arizona, and this is my first time and glad to be with you all.
Oh, good. Glad you made it today. You. You bet. Okay, so moving on. Just there. Just a quick note, you may have already noticed, well, first of all, I know we're having some website issues. So hopefully we're gonna get that cleaned up and fixed in the fairly near future. In the meantime, I have changed the Zoom transcripts transcript. So now I'm providing you with Link rather than a document to otter AI, where you can not only review the transcript, but as you're reviewing it, if you want to listen to it, you can actually double click on the paragraph that you're reading, and you can actually hear the discussion. So I'm gonna continue to do that on into the future. Okay. So updates. I don't know if SandipI know, I talked to him last week. And I know he's, he's overwhelmed at this point. So, Nicole, do you have some updates for us today?
Nicole, are you there? You were there a minute ago? Okay.
Oh, there's Petra. So Petra, do you want to introduce yourself real quickly?
I just did a while ago, Okay.
I mean, myself again? Sure. How are you native to Arizona? With Promise Arizona and glad to be with you all, just to hear what you're all doing.
So you're a recipient of a grant. Is that correct?
Yes, we will be doing that we will be doing some of the field work.
And so we're going to well, we'll come back to that in just a little while. Want to talk about that. So I'm sorry to call you still here.
Doesn't look like it, Steve.
Oh, she was here a minute ago. Okay, so moving on. Let's just get down to our presentation today. And then we'll come back.
Steve, I I can give you a little update.
Okay. Well, yes, Cindy. I'm sorry. Yeah, go ahead.
Yes, Cindy Hogan. I'm the new digital equity program manager for the state of Arizona and working with Sandeep and we don't have a whole lot to report just getting this the broadband office staffed up to manage all the work we have coming with the digital equity plan and in the bead funding. And basically, if there's there are NOFOs out for both the digital equity plan and the bead program and so most of most of what's in those is what's going on. We're a little busy to try and give to group give a lot of specific updates but um We're moving forward. And I'm glad glad that everybody's here and I'll put my email in the chat. So everybody knows how to reach me.
Thank you. Thanks, Cindy. And I'm gonna include you. I'm sorry, I skipped you. But I definitely want to include you regularly and Sandip may or may not be here but want to include you on a regular basis and up for an update. Okay, I don't know as anyways, uh, we share you online. And look at the participants here. I
don't think so today, I don't
feel we should either.
Okay, moving on. So let's get right into. So Mala, are you here today? Apparently not. Where is everybody today? But Erin, do you want to give us a quick update? I know you and Anne Marie co have been communicating. Can you give us a quick update on what's happening with the signup campaigns?
Sure, not a ton of information on that front. Other than what I shared last week that we put out an email to the county librarians and all the public library directors in the state alerting them to the fact that the continuous enrollment for Medicaid ended on the first and so they might get questions from their patrons about how to get back enrolled and all of that. And so we're just kind of sharing out the information at this point on the ACP print campaign, front, still not a huge update there either. However, I was able to connect with the folks who will be sending the print job in. And we were able to update the back of the flyer to include local contact information for both connect Arizona's digital navigators, as well as the navigators at the digital equity Institute at ASU. So when we get those items printed and out to our libraries, they'll have a local contact for connection to work through the ACP signup process. So those are my updates at this time. Thank you.
You bet. Does anybody know is there any extension of time for people to get renewed for?
Excuse me for access? Well, I can speak to that sort of. So basically, it's a it's a year long process to go through all of the people who would be dropped. I mean, it's not like a tomorrow, they're done kind of thing. They're working through their lists of people who need to re establish eligibility. And so it will be kind of like a rolling happening, if you will, it's just that going forward, they'll have to go back to how it was pre pandemic, where they Prove Eligibility yearly. Okay.
So if they missed the it wasn't at the April 1 deadline, they still can.
Well, that's, yeah, that's the date at which the continuous enrollment ends. So it's not that they're immediately without health care. It's just that that was the date that the process for the RE enrollment and the going back to the way that things were prior to the pandemic is in effect, again, if that makes sense.
Okay. Any questions for Aaron? So Petra, Erin is one of the people you definitely want to connect with?
I hear that, yeah, I will do that.
So as long as
Oh, I was just gonna say Petra, for context, I actually am the digital inclusion library consultant with the State Library. So I'm just helping with the the access and Medicaid Riri renewal stuff are getting the information out. But it's nice to meet you, and congratulations on your grant.
And yes, I would love to talk with you about those issues are really, really important to our community. And I fantastic. My email in the chat so that we can connect offline.
So next week that we have four communities who have received those grant those ACP grants and hoping that we will have them all together next Monday to get an update on who's got grants, what they're planning to do, where they can connect with each other and where they connect with people like they are and all the other folks who participate with with the Taskforce. So that's my tentative plan.
Steve, we're meeting with all these folks tomorrow with the with the City of Phoenix, so I'm happy to mention it to them and give them the link for the meeting.
Well, everybody well, we've been in touch now with three of them. We've got the other one is pending. Coconino County is pending so I've I've outreach to them but didn't hear about From time to time, okay, but that's fine. That's fine. Sure, sure.
I've been in touch with Coconino. So I actually invited them to the meeting tomorrow. Oh, thanks, Cindy.
Great. Okay, so anyway,
could you pop up that last email real quick? Because I didn't get you know, II Laura handles at Arizona library that well.
I think she put it
in the chat, Petra, because she's, I'll get it in the chat. If you
know, you're good. I'm just in Carolina, my daughter's school. I'm sorry. It's e l o r a n d. O S at az library.gov. Got it.
Thank you. And also, Petra, just for your information. After the meeting, hopefully, in the next couple of days, that I send out a summary of the meeting, including the list of people who have registered for this meeting today. It has their contact information including email, etc. Good. Great. So we tried to do that all the time. Okay, anything more about that?
If not, let's move on to our presentation today. And I want to introduce Ryan Froley. Is that correct? Ryan?
That's close. I know it doesn't look like it but it's actually Froehle is how you would say it.
I should have known that after we just don't know probably. Do you want to ask Do you want to share anything? Do you want to share? Ryan? Should I stop sharing?
Yeah, I had put together a little little slide for everybody. So if I if I'm able to share that.
So Ryan, if I can Ryan. So Ryan is kind of the new guy representing Arizona with excuse me, with our with Kajeet. And Kajeet got involved with us early has been a sponsor for us. And hopefully they will, they will be continued to be a sponsor. So without that a good chance that Kajeet has been doing some great stuff. Some of our folks have been in touch with them in the past. So I thought that after Ryan reached out and said, Hey, I want to be involved with the Taskforce. Does this be a good time for the for him to give us an update about about Kajeet? So with that, Ryan?
Awesome. Well, I appreciate it. Steve. Yeah, I you know, for those of you that maybe don't know, I just connected with Steve last week and said, you know, hey, I live in Gilbert. You know, I'm seeing some of the things that are being done kind of up the state level, but as well as like in Phoenix, and some of the smart city initiatives and different things. And it was interesting to kind of read about all the things that are being done, really kind of in my backyard as a as a resident of Gilbert. So I'm privileged to be a part of it. And I think, Steve, thank you for allowing me to come say a quick hello, kind of introduce ourselves, I think could you just probably familiar to some of you, and maybe not to others, I don't want to turn this into like a like a salesy type of overview or anything of that nature, I just like to let you know that we have a presence here in Arizona, and kind of what we do, because it's very much in alignment with a lot of the things that you guys are working on, mainly in the areas of digital literacy, digital inclusion, and just kind of connecting people to information, right. And particularly like students in education, that's kind of where we started. So about 12 years ago, or so we started provisioning schools with smart spots today, a lot of times you hear them called hotspots, right? Kind of for mobile connectivity. It's great that students are being given homework at home to do online. But I think seven out of 10 latest statistics, about 70% of all teachers are assigning homework to be done online and in some capacity. But as you and I both know, not everybody has that ability to go home and connect to the internet. So that's really kind of Ben Kajeet mission to kind of really help bridge that homework gap for the most part. So we started off, again, kind of in education. But again, if you're providing internet, you have some some duties, in our opinion, to kind of then make sure that that search that access to that internet is safe. And so we do come with civic compliant filters for all of our devices that we hand out to schools. So really, in addition to schools, it's really about kind of connecting the community. So I know that we work, for example, we work with Pima County comm library cert system. We're working with Casa cron, currently right now. So it's really kind of just expanding it out, not just you know, the school but also kind of out into the community because the beyond just students. Obviously we know that those that are under connected as a community are at a notable disadvantage. But this is kind of essentially where we got it we got our foothold. So one of the things that we do is we are carrier agnostic is what that refers to. What that means is basically we can send out devices and have them operate on AT and T or Verizon or US Cellular or T Mobile. But they're a whole house and managed under one pane of glass which is our Sentinel platform. This is where we institute our filtering. This is where you can kind of see some allowed traffic versus some block traffic, right? We are not in the business of providing just broadband Internet access for everyone on filtered. This is mainly for educationally related purposes. Not so Timmy can go home after school and stream Netflix till 2am. Not at all the point of our program. So you can kind of see here some of the things that we would allow, and not a lot. But the analytics, this is really big for a lot of our customers is to be able to drive reporting, right, we can kind of during the height of the pandemic, distance learning was was, you know, it was definitely kind of it was had never been needed as much as it had been needed at that time, I guess what I'm trying to say. So having the analytics to then support that a lot of schools made use of ECF funding, which is going to require you to kind of keep tabs on on data usage and utilization in terms of how that relates to your free lunch and reduced lunch programs, that sort of thing. So having that ability, that visibility to run reports, again, kind of do some tweaking to your your filtering there, suspend unsuspend, there's check in checkout features, all kinds of housed in one is our Sentinel platform here. And this is what it looks like. This is what a lot of our libraries and schools have. It's a basic kit with a smart spot, a charger, a case, a quickstart guide, we branched out then this was kind of what we'd been giving out to schools for quite some time. And then we branched out, we actually started working with Acer and with CTL to offer LTE embedded. So it kind of take that smart spot cellular connectivity, technology and put that actually into a computer into a laptop into a Chromebook. And now you're one device one to one devices for schools now have the ability anywhere, when they're when they're on campus, they can connect to Wi Fi. But when they're off campus, they can connect to cellular connectivity. So anywhere on the planet that has you know, Verizon coverage, for example, that student can hop on and have access to online resources to get their homework done. So this has been a welcome addition for us. And it's been well received by a lot of school districts who have one to one programs, but also recognizing that just because the student has a laptop doesn't necessarily mean that they go home and have that internet access, right. So this kind of solves that problem for them. Then we also started to put it on on buses, I don't know if too many of you are familiar with with our smart bus solution. But it basically just kind of extends the classroom. We work all over the country. And there's a lot of areas especially like Wyoming, Iowa, parts of the Midwest and parts of you know, New Mexico and Arizona, even that are very rural, and there's a hour plus ride from to and from school in the morning. So that's, you know, 45 minutes to an hour before school, 45 minutes to an hour plus after school, that kids are just sitting there doing nothing. And sometimes we see behavioral issues, right, kids are kind of bored and have nothing to do than to start picking on each other. Really, this is just a way to kind of extend that to allow students to have access to online resources while in transit. And that could be before and after school. But that could also be extracurricular activities, field trips, sporting events, anything like that is kind of what our smart plus solution would be capable for. Really, we've now taken and that's kind of the education space that we've been in for quite some time. But we're really now branching out. And this is kind of where I get excited into things like public sector and smart cities. Because to me, I think this is like the Internet of Things, I have a slide here, talking a little bit about that just really kind of getting everything connected. Because really, the whole purpose of being connected is just to be able to share information. That's the whole reason you know why the internet is so valuable to all of us is to access and utilize information to make informed decisions. So that's this is where I like to, you know, come in and really kind of be a part of things because it to me, I just like the the advancements and the opportunities that it provides to the community. So things like smart transit, even even things like like monitoring garbage levels, right. So if you have a city worker, for example, that's maybe routinely running around to all the different parks to check garbage levels, we could put in install sensors to where they will send us messages to let us know when those garbage bins are full. So instead of just blindly sending somebody out into the field, they're actually being smarter about their work day and going and just, you know, checking on the trash cans that are that are in need. So But starting off, I'm trying to reach out to valley metro right now to kind of see I don't think there's any sort of like passenger Wi Fi opportunities for them for passengers and commuters. So that's something we're working with. And then lastly would be 5g and private LTE networks. So especially we were starting to work especially with NTIA working a lot with tribal communities and rural areas where, sadly, you know, cable companies don't see it, you know as as a profitable thing for them to go lay and install cable or fiber. Or maybe you know, the the major carriers like AT and T and Verizon, maybe they don't see that the this particular city is populous enough to make it worth their while to go up and throw up a tower, we can actually go ahead and build your own private network for that community to operate under. And we do that with with schools, we do that with entire communities. So that's been something are probably the most recent development with Kajita capabilities. And again, lastly, kind of just taking a look, particularly for me, as a resident of Arizona, I work with Arizona, as well as New Mexico. So I know that there's a lot of tribal communities, a lot of rural areas that don't necessarily have connectivity readily available to them. Which obviously means that they're at a notable disadvantage, you know, and we would really like to kind of do what we can to kind of curtail that a little bit. So that's about all I had, I have my contact information here, if I'm open to any questions that you guys might have for me, as well. But yeah, I guess maybe the biggest takeaways is we're here, I'm happy to be a part of this. And we've been kind of working on some of the things that this taskforce has been working on. Sounds like we've been kind of working side by side on like, unknowingly, a little bit, kind of working towards the same goals. And the same mission is to get people connected to access information for the betterment of the community. And really, you know, I guess, in my personal opinion, I kind of just feel like having access to the internet and to have information at the house is practically just about as important as running water, you know, it should be basically a basic utility that we should be able to see in every single household in America. And so I'm really hoping that, you know, between our conservative efforts here, that we can make that a bit more of a reality for the folks here in Arizona. So yeah, thank you.
Comment, to Ryan. You know, when I worked primarily in South Phoenix, and we were promoting, obviously, the construction of the light rail, and that was one of the the one of the pieces that we would talk about is that people writing the library will be able to sit for at least an hour and read a book. And I haven't seen any figures anywhere, maybe if you have some figures of how that was able to increase readership or at least increase some kind of academic success with linking a hotspot or on an opponent like we have somewhere on a basketball. But I think that I we really need to talk about that. Because that's true in other cities in other parts of the country
is something I am I am trying to reach out there a little hard. I haven't had much success in hearing back from them. But it is something kind of on my on my list of initiatives is to work with the Valley Metro Transit committees there, so Okay, so, that'd be that'd be great. Especially even Yes, in Phoenix with the library, but also I think of Tempe with with ASU being right there. All of the commuters, inner campus shuttles and things like that, that valley metro utilizes as well. So yeah, that'd be a great opportunity for the commuters here in the area. Yeah, thank you.
That's right. Put your contact information in the chat.
I will do that.
Okay. Ryan, I think you already have it.
Well, I tell you what, I have it on the slide, I'll share it. I'll stop sharing my screen. But I will put my contact information in the chat as well. I appreciate everyone's time. And I look forward to one of the many meetings to see what I can do to be a contributor here. So,
Ryan, you've talked a little bit about what you're doing in the digital inclusion space.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, um, so we work with Headstart and in certain states as well, not every state, necessarily, but we work with early childhood development programs. I know that, you know, there's research out there that says, you should limit screen time for youngsters, which is definitely true. But also, you know, we start them out usually on like a tablet, right? It's usually like a, like a tablet that has a like a ruggedized case for drops and spills and that sort of thing that that children might be more prone to. But it just gets them in front of a little bit of some electronics to kind of learn some of those basics and have that connectivity, especially then once they go home to kind of again, extend the classroom, same same premise in concept for, you know, elementary, high school, middle school students, even higher education. But yeah, just starting a little bit younger, to build some of those digital learning literacy skills that they're going to have to rely on. I think, I know my, my youngest son is 10. And I think next year, he's gonna he'll be in fifth grade. And I think they're going to start passing out laptops to all the kids so I mean, he's 10 years old, he's you know, but he's gonna have a laptop and he's gonna need to know how to use it. So starting off a little bit younger than that was some some tablets just to kind of get some of those fundamentals. I think it's very important. Likewise, we actually worked with some in retirement communities, kind of some senior centers as well to kind of promote and foster some digital learning and literacy amongst our older population, which I think is great as well.
And I don't want to be a that is a cop repeating myself, but some of the work that we've been doing in this community is working with tablets to teach adults English, that works really well. And they take the tablet home so that they can do their homework.
That's great.
That's great. I love that you added a cell phone component to enhance Chromebooks to schools there, is that a huge premium? Or like, kind of a couple 100 bucks or
it's you know, what, it's probably a bit more expensive than just your standard, like on an what we call that as LTE embedded. That's what that refers to that that technology. But no, I want to say I mean, obviously, it varies a little bit based on the part of the country we work with some resellers and different things on pricing. But no, it's definitely not it doesn't make them astronomical by any stretch. They're they're very competitive in comparison to Chromebooks that don't have that feature. But because the love schools are going back to or going to that one to one type of type of setup, which is which is great. Understanding that, hey, there's maybe a certain percentage of your student population where that one to one, that device doesn't particularly benefit the student off campus, once they hop off Wi Fi, and they can't get signal they're going to need, you're going to need some other solution. So this kind of pairs that smart spot technology and embedded in that, yeah, to answer your question, no, it doesn't put it out of range, it's very much still a pretty affordable solution. And you know, depending on what the school wishes to do, they can still purchase like the extended warranty cases, that sort of thing for to kind of protect them as well to protect their investment. Steve?
So I know a couple years ago, we were able to get one of the Kajeet grants, are you all doing that, again, as a nonprofit to provide devices or hotspots? Because I haven't seen anything. So I was just wondering, is that something you guys are going to do?
I'm sorry, was that was that for you? Ryan? Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, so I'm sorry. Um, so we have put out there some like digital inclusion grants in the past? We I think we did it for the past two years in a row. I know. For sure. I would imagine we probably will do it again this year. I just, you know, I haven't been made. It hasn't been made known to me as far as maybe when that would happen. But it's usually something that we do. I know we've done for the last. I've been with three years. And we've done it the last two out of the three that I've been with kanji. So I would imagine it's something I can look into. And if you'd like I can follow up with you offline.
Yeah, no, that'd be great. Yeah, because we still have the we got we I think we got like 20 or 25. And so a year, but we still have the devices. So if we could just get a grant to turn the services back on we could read issue them back out if that's possible.
Yeah, no, absolutely. And a lot of times, I think part part of it is they'll they'll put them out there and they're good for that 12 months. And then we usually kind of let it be up to the, to the school or to the order, we build those out to to kind of see if they would like to renew that service, if they felt it was valuable to their students and things. But I can definitely see about any sort of grants to kind of, I guess, re up so to speak, to allow that service to begin to begin again. Yeah, absolutely.
No, thank you. Shereka, do you want to just tell them quickly who you are.
I'm a person that's in a box right now. I'm Shereka Jackson. I'm the founder, CEO of Future Stars, Inc, as well as we have the title one tech program where we give out devices to the community as well. We did hotspots to underserved and Title One schools and Title One students and just trying to get them connected as well as I do a STEM programming. And you mentioned and I probably will email you because you mentioned you all do senior programming, which I just got off a call to do a senior program at a place called grandparents place is where the grandparents are raising the kids and so the grandparents don't know how to use the devices that the kids are having. So we're looking at how we can stand something up for those grandparents in those facilities.
That's awesome. Yeah, very good. We should definitely take a take a moment to connect offline. Absolutely. Yep. Thank you.
So Ryan, you had several accolades from some folks who have used Kajeet and really seemed to like your service.
I won't argue with that. You know, happy customers and happy testimonials are always something that we appreciate it. So yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Good. Yeah. And once again, you know, thank you to everyone for the time But like I said, I just connected with Steve last week and he was like, Hey, not only you want to join, but you want to present to the to the group. So I was like, you know, sure. I'll take that as a take that as a an honor, you know, to be a part of things here today. So yeah, I appreciate everyone's time. Hopefully this didn't bore everybody to death here.
So sounds great. Thanks, Ryan. Thanks for joining us, and having to cheat back involved with us again. Okay, so now I guess you missed Brian's presentation, but as you know, share the video share the video. Thank you. So you bet.
Okay.
So moving on. We have some announcements later. But before I move on, Mauricio, I think you may have joined a couple of minutes late. So Erin gave us a little bit of an update. But do you have anything else that you'd like to share out about what's happening with the ACP and with the Access signups?
Not anything new. I know that they started this enrolling people from Max's on April 1. So Saturday was the first day that this enrollment began here in Arizona. And as we had talked about earlier, this process is going to be a nine to 12 month process. But we definitely want to get the word out early to make sure that a lot of people will not lose their coverage. I think we have mentioned this number before we're over 600,000 people in Arizona will be impacted by this. But I haven't heard anything new other than the things that we have talked about lately. So Maria,
if somebody gets disenrolled, can they appeal that or not?
It really depends. But I think the most important part is finding out what the options are for those folks that do not qualify anymore. Maybe because they're over income. Now, since they haven't had to do a renewal for the last two or three years. Some of those people may already be working, and maybe they're getting insurance through their employer. It could be that some people have moved out of state. And then you're going to have the other people that have never reported any changes as far as how to get in touch with them. And those are the ones that we're mostly concerned with. Because they haven't really kept their address or phone number up to date, and they're not going to be able to do anything when they receive a letter from from the state.
Are you sure you want to just tell people who you are real quickly?
Hi, yes, my name is Mauricio Orozco and the Community Engagement Manager for Carefirst Healthplan. We are one of the Access Health Plans providing services in northern Arizona in the five northern counties.
And there's what seven of those plans in the state is that right?
Yes, the the state is divided into three different regions. So right now it's Northern Arizona, central Arizona, which includes Maricopa Pinal and Hilah counties. And then southern Arizona is basically the rest of the states. So there's a total of seven access health plans in the state of Arizona. And we're one of them.
So Petra, just for your information. So Marcicio is just one of those many people, as I mentioned to you, briefly is that we have a good outreach around the state, and certainly is a great opportunity for partnership with you. Along with of course the other three plans.
That's wonderful. I spent 10 years in southern Arizona and so know that area as well.
Cool. Okay, so moving on. Mala, are you there you are. So Mala, you want to give us an update on what's happening.
Have you recovered?
Pain, all the grindstone
just about you know, we we just
introduce yourself, please do it.
This is Mala Muralidharan and I am the state ERate coordinator for public libraries. I work with the State Library of Arizona. We just finished our ERate application deadline. It was the day of the deadline when we last had the meeting. I think and so I'm pleased to report that there were about 1222 applications for schools or libraries. And the total pre discounted amount that was applied for was $116 million. And as the discounted amount would be would amount to about $86 million. So that's a that's a lot of money. that we when, if I want to, if approved, I think it's when we are approved, we would get back for our internet and internal connections for schools and libraries. So the bulk of it, of course went to was applications from schools, and school library consortiums. We've tried to move slowly towards having more schools and libraries consortium rather than have individual library applications, library or library system applications, mainly because that helps lower the costs, as well as helps build networks around the state. So many of the schools and school districts and libraries within a particular county are connected by the same network and apply as a consortium. So we're moving slowly towards that. And Arizona in Arizona, our prices are also coming down quite a bit compared to the national average. In some places, we're able to get one gig for $1,000 a month, which is like $1 amount, which I think is is awesome. We have, we also worked on state master contracts, and we have state master contracts, running up to 2025. In most for most carriers. But that's that's about what I've been working on for the last, you know, few weeks. And I'm slowly trying to focus my attention on other things that my job entails some back to us team.
Okay, so now a couple of things. SHLB has an event coming up. And Mark, you put some information about the advocacy report from SHLB. But there's an event coming up in a couple of days, if I'm not mistaken. Talking about Anchor institutions and connectivity.
Yes, shall be is shall be does an annual policy roadmap, I mean updates, they pull their roadmap policy roadmap annually, although the plan itself lasts over definitely goes over that year, that they do want to have their roadmap out pretty quickly, probably end of this week, if I'm not mistaken. Got my dates all mixed up a little bit after this late deadline. But the policy roadmap actually looks at several areas, policies, policy guidelines for cybersecurity, of course, policy guidelines for USF funding policy guidelines for legislation, what advocacy they they need to do. And of course, since we don't, as a state library, we as a policy, we don't participate in advocacy, but we guide them with any data that they may need in order to do that. So also, their policy roadmap includes working with the FCC on guidelines for E Rate and other funding for health and libraries and schools. So because the shell Baker, you know, works together with all these organizations, and of late, there have been, they've been working on ECF, as well as to extend the deadline to advocate for extension of the ECF and ACP programs. And also any legislation like RB NOFO, and de novo and things like that. So the roadmap looks at all those and you have a link to that. Thank you, Mark for putting that link. Those that link takes you to the policy. roadmap.
Yes. Anything else? My we're
not not at the present. Aaron is working on ACP and we haven't made any progress yet. Where we are on a holding pattern for our telemedicine, telehealth Navajo Nation project, which will start soon. May will is when we are planning to start working on that project.
Erin, do you have anything else that you want to add about the State Library besides the other project you reported on earlier?
I don't but I know Holly and Meghan are here as well. So if they have anything else to add, but I'm good, thank you.
I was just about to ask Holly, just first, and then I'll go to Holly. So Holly, anything that you'd like to add?
No, I think Mala and Erin, have it covered. Thank you.
For those of you who don't know Holly is the state librarian, and she knows that I love her department and all the great work that they do. So really appreciate that, Holly. Thank you, Steve. You betcha. You betcha. So let's see who else we got on the call here today.
Go back and share for just a second here.
Need to update this page as matter of fact. Let's see what else we need to announce here real quickly. So a couple of things, a couple of announcements. Again, what I was referring to I guess SHLB has a webinar, Do Anchors Hold the Key to BEAD success. That's coming up on April 12. And again, in my follow up to the meeting, I will include the link to be able to participate. And I think Mala can attest to this, that if you miss that webinar, that they do share the link the recording afterwards. So just wanted to I don't know, model if you want to have anything more about that.
Right? The webinars are available to public only for 30 days after the conclusion of it. After that, it's available only to members, it's on the member portal. It is available only for 30 days.
Okay, that's good to know. All righty, moving on. And Maricio, maybe you can speak this or anybody else that I believe on the 18th and 19th of April, that the Alliance for Community Health Centers, conference is going to be taking place. And it seems like that would be a good place for some of us to participate in consistent with our interest with ACP, anybody planning to attend or know anything more about that conference.
And I know Janet's on the call, and she would know.
Yeah, she couldn't make it today. But she'll probably be here next week. But
I would encourage some people that really want to connect with our federally qualified health centers. I don't know if people know this or not. But this conference is basically a statewide network of community health centers that receive federal funding. And those health centers tend to be in low income areas to get the funding. That's why they're federally qualified. So if you wanted to make additional contacts or look for partnership opportunities, I would encourage folks that want to partner with those type of anchor institutions throughout Arizona. They have a lot of those health centers in rural areas of Arizona as well. So it's a good network to be connected to. So I would encourage people that can attend just to go there and make partnerships and learn how you can because obviously, broadband has gone beyond just healthcare alone and the schools, it's everywhere. So I think it's good to think about broadband, as I have mentioned before, as a social determinants of health, which I think that's going to open a lot of additional funding opportunities. If you think of broadband as social determinants of health, which is I think it's it's being called that in in the nation as well.
Maricio do you have a connection with that group?
Yes, I do. I can put that information in the chat.
So. So a couple of things kind of come to mind for me, if I remember correctly, maybe Mauricio you and others, that they quote, have navigators who work in those organizations?
Yeah, they have a statewide network of community. assisters are navigators that assist the community in applying for government programs. So they already have the experience of the paperwork and the forms and the information that those programs need to qualify, obviously, one being ACP, the same type of paperwork, they just might need specific training, or even if you just want to promote the program at this locations, that would be good as well.
So recently, maybe we can talk off offline, maybe you and Erinand I can talk offline, about contacting these folks who are planning that conference and see if there's some way that we can include some information or discussion about ACP.
Yeah, you know what Um, tech person you guys already know is Allan. So Alan, okay, can definitely connect us to see if someone's interested in doing like a workshop at the conference focused on the work that we do or you know, that could be an opportunity there.
Good. Okay. Well, so we can follow up. And you know, well and well also right for ECL. Yep. Yeah. So maybe, between you and Erin and me, we can contact Allen, and see if there's some way that we can connect with that conference. Okay. Thank you. And then, again, Janet is not on the call today. But the Arizona telemedicine Council, quarterly meeting is coming up. And I believe it's open to the public, it is a web, you can participate online, that 11am to 1pm. Mountain Standard Time on April the 19th, also. And so I believe that that's open to the public. And then, again, Sharika, do you want to just do a quickie about your hands on STEM fair?
Sure, April 22nd 21 days away, we will have our eighth annual hands on STEM fair. We are planning for over 300 attendees. We haven't hit that number in enrollment yet. So please share. If you are an organization that has a stem activity that's very engaging, and you would like to bring that activity to the event, you can send me an email, I will send you the application, the application is free to fill out. But I just need to know what you would need. We're always looking to expose our youth to more activities besides the six that we're going to host. So our goal is about 20 activities. And I think we're about 12 right now. So we would love to have you come out and host an activity or if your organization is looking to sponsor an event that is held in South Phoenix to increase STEM education and STEM awareness. We also are taking sponsors. So we would appreciate your support.
Social read the same question, is there an opportunity somewhere in that to promote ACP or the adults that attend or
parents or parents? Yeah, parents are definitely there. Yeah, there's definitely the opportunity to have the information and talk with individuals if someone
Okay, so So if anybody who's working with ACP who wants to connect with Eureka, and see if there's some way to include ACP signups without event? I think it'd be a great thing. Okay. Last thing is announcement. Training, excuse me, the Arizona Technology Council, Peter, and I believe that Department of Ed, you're online and just a couple of minutes. But the Arizona Technology Council, cybersecurity Summit is coming up on May the 11th and Phoenix could opportunity if you're interested in cybersecurity. It's a good opportunity to connect with other people who are working in cybersecurity. There Any other announcements before we go we backtrack here for a minute. So Phillip, Are you online? I thought I saw you Phillip look saying. Yes, sir. There you are. So you've got anything you want to tell us about?
Well, from last week, Shelby Brown, our tribal and rural community coordinator. She hosted the tribal and rural roundtable in Maricopa and we got to see their CTE program. Anybody that wants to check that out, you can check out their Instagram on 24 pin tech. So that was really cool to see. We have no other updates from od TL at this time. So yeah, that's about it. Okay.
Hey, Philip, do you want to cover the cover the final mile awards?
No, Rory, you're supposed to do that.
Oh, man, I appreciate that. But there were three more that I didn't get. So you know,
yeah, I can do that. So we had final mile phase four. Go out. The bids were due last Friday. And the awards were approved by the board this morning. So Ash Fork and Grand Canyon was awarded to Comnet. Yucca was awarded to Scary Communications and CiviQ was awarded to Triad wireless. Right, I'm telling Milan I did your part. Oh, Oh.
Okay. Any questions for Philip?
So, so Philip, you mentioned the Shelby Brown, and you and I chatted a little bit, hopefully within the next possibly next week, finally connected with Janet. And what I'm hoping to do is to include D. S, and Shelby and Janet. And I've talked a little bit with mava, about trying to get a kind of a picture, kind of little, a little panel discussion, that are meeting us probably next week on what's happening in Indian country. And so we have some key people with our various institutions who are working in those communities right now. And it'd be good to get a kind of a snapshot of what's happening. So that's kind of my plan, hopefully next week or the week after. So anything else? Any other announcements or you have anything else that you want to add?
No, no, Phillip just said we, all the other final mile projects are officially completed, I think sephorus Noida and we're, we're just waiting for some paperwork on. But like I said, we got another one, the Civic new tribe, which we're looking at right now, trying to sell to get, get that deployed as quick as possible. Okay.
Any other anything else, any other announcements, events coming up? Things that you want people to know about?
Hearing none,
but just a reminder that we do do our Kibitzing with Colleagues after this event, we stop recording, and just to have an informal discussion sharing, it may last two minutes, it may last an hour. It could be three people, it could be one, it could be whatever. So if you're interested in staying on afterwards, you're more than welcome.
To do that,
you know, I do have one minor real quick one. I don't know how many. But one of the early final mile projects we got was Loma which is outside of he live in Arizona, we just launched sila bed last week with 500 meg wireless service. We turned it on this morning, and our guys are starting to slip. We've got about five people out there. But it'll be it will be one gigabit per second complete wireless over the next next three months. So it'll be the first one and that that level of performance.
So Jocelyn, I see that you're online. And if I do this update with what's happening in Indian country, I would definitely like to have you participate also.
That'd be great. Thank you so much.
So just remind people, Jocelyn, what you do.
You're Hi, everybody. I'm Jocelyn Beard. I'm the tribal relations manager for DES. I oversee the Office of Federal Relations. And I'm at the director's office.
So can you tell us a little bit about what that entails? And working with the with the the folks on the reservations?
Sure. So as you know, the US is a fairly large department. And we have we have seven divisions plus one program, which is the Arizona intervention early intervention program. And so I have a team of tribal liaisons for each of the divisions to be the point of contact for tribal governments, tribal staff, tribal members, tribal families, or in connecting with the effects and so we are supporting resource for the department. We are also involved with tribal consultation. So we definitely make sure that any kind of changes policy programmatic that are coming through the pike, we are including the tribes as far as how they would like to be consulted in those changes or what kind of impacts of my house. Also, we also want to make sure that any state plan or planning have any sources that are happening within the department, whether it be a 10 a state plan or snap state plan. We are involving the tribes at the very start of conversation, so that they're at the table when those are being drafted. And so we definitely are a resource and support Florida Department and each of the travel aides on our scenes within their division. So if you have any questions, we do have our Federal Relations website about a coordinate Yes, we have all of our previous tribal consultation reports. We have already newsletters that we just released for the third quarter. So that's up on our website. We have Tableau informational forums that we have every other month. Our next one is going to be this month on April 26. And that's via zoom. And it's breakout sessions that each of our divisions plus Arizona early intervention program has breakout room. And they present and provide updated information from their respective divisions and areas about what's happening in the ies. So definitely a lot of engagement with our tribal partners. Obviously, we are focusing more on the government to government aspects. So we want to make sure that we are being inclusive in terms of how we do business at the state level here at the ies and making sure that we are true government to government partnership with our tribal nations.
So Jocelyn a couple of weeks ago, we heard a little bit about DES involvement with with ACP, are you involved with that at all? And what we're, again, I think that we would like to include you in a overall discussion. But do you have any thoughts that you might want to share about that at the moment?
I'm sure, I think, because we are growing, office, and any kind of, for anybody, if there's anything that is involving tribes, and also the ES, Facebook, reach out to me, and I want to make sure I'm available just to kind of lend not only what kind of work that we're doing, that might be a potential collaboration, but also just the information that we know from that. We are conversing with our tribal leaders. So we do meet with the tribal leaders on a regular basis. And so any kind of information that you might have, I can also share that as well as I do my individual meetings with the tribal leaders.
Thank you so much. Again, I'll be in touch with you. But can you tentatively put on your calendar? You've been here pretty regularly, which I appreciate. But if you can tentatively put it on your calendar, that possibly next week, I want to have this discussion about about Indian country.
Sure. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. And um, I put in my email in the chat as well as our OTDR website address in the chat so you can see that and
check it out. Okay, thanks. Thanks, Jocelyn. Appreciate it. Anything else before I turn off the recording and kibitz with anybody who wants to stay online and Kibitz?