Donte Kirby

Technologist Jason Hardebeck is no longer serving as the City of Baltimore’s director of broadband and digital equity. And Hardebeck’s former department, the Mayor’s Office of Broadband and Digital Equity (BDE), will no longer be housed within the Mayor’s Office. BDE is now located within the Baltimore City Office of Information and Technology (BCIT). Kenya Asli, BCIT’s director of strategic initiatives, will be the interim director of broadband and digital equity until a permanent hire for the position is found.

The Digital Connectivity Act passed in April 2021 established the Office of Statewide Broadband (OSB), with a goal to get all Marylanders connected to high-speed, affordable broadband internet by 2026. It was also tasked with administering the $300 million in funding from the federal government’s American Rescue Plan that Maryland allocated toward the expansion of affordable and reliable internet across the state. Kenrick Gordon, previously the state’s director of the Maryland Office of Rural Broadband, was later named director of the OSB.

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott laid out the priorities and process for distributing the $641 million Baltimore City will receive as part of the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to the community. Broadband and small businesses figure to play a key role in the plans. With the investment in broadband, Baltimore City is further prioritizing internet connectivity at a time when the City’s yawning digital divide

The Robert W. Deutsch Foundation is graduating the first cohort of the Digital Equity Leadership Lab, a pilot leadership program that offers training on everything that a person seeking to be an expert on internet advocacy needs to know. The five-week program covered topics including laws governing the internet, core concepts about network engineering and the workings of community internet networks, like mesh networks. The group of 25 participants also met with guest speakers, such as former Federal Communications Commission Commissioner Mignon L.

As part of a $3.9 billion allocation of COVID-19 relief funding from the latest federal law, the American Rescue Plan, Maryland is committing $300 million toward broadband and digital equity initiatives. The package is part of an agreement reached between Gov. Larry Hogan (R-MD) and the Democratic legislative leaders of the Maryland General Assembly.

The City of Baltimore has formed a digital alliance with Microsoft to bring a collection of programs for residents of Baltimore looking to learn the fundamentals of coding and robotics, as well as basic digital literacy.