With the economy in turmoil, it’s not surprising that U.S. mayors are looking for fresh ideas to jump-start local economies. It was in that spirit that the U.S. Conference of Mayors invited the Knight Center of Digital Excellence to deliver a keynote address on the potential of broadband and the promise of a “connected community” at its 2009 winter conference on Jan. 18 in Washington, D.C. (See video from Conference of Mayors broadband discussion)

One person who knows how the Knight Center can help communities is Manny Diaz, mayor of Miami, and president of the conference of mayors. The Knight Center has been working with Mayor Diaz and other Miami leaders to develop a community broadband strategy, so he asked the Knight Center to explain the tangible impact broadband infrastructure would have on creating jobs and helping local economies.

Key concepts from the Knight Center’s presentation include:

•    Get local people involved – government leaders, educators, employers, public safety professionals and others representing important sectors of the community. Each stakeholder should understand local needs so that community requirements drive decision-making and spending choices on a broadband infrastructure.

•    Address the needs of your individual community. Milledgeville, Ga., for instance, plans to put a school bus on the road equipped with Internet-enabled PCs to teach parents who are not computer savvy how they can support their children’s education. For a mostly rural community like Milledgeville, it’s cost-effective way to reach people in outlying areas.

•    Give Internet access to people who don’t have it.  In Akron, Ohio, a wireless Internet network is going to cover 12 square miles in and around the central downtown area. City officials already have plans to use that connectivity to improve fire safety and crime prevention to name just a couple of examples.

•    Plan how your community will sustain the cost of a broadband infrastructure.  In Cleveland, the nonprofit OneCommunity has established a self-sustaining, world-class fiber-optic and wireless broadband network. We’ll talk about details in a future posting.

Writing in his blog recently, Mayor Diaz talked about the many failed attempts to provide broadband wireless infrastructure to communities. Projects often ran out of money because of poor planning, inadequate investment or both.

Now, with the current economic crisis, there is new urgency to do things “the right way.”  Both Congress and the new Obama Administration propose multibillion-dollar spending on broadband infrastructure as part of a federal economic stimulus plan. For communities, those with broadband plans in place will have an advantage, especially those with “shovel-ready” projects that don’t require a lot of lead time.

For more information, check out a report from the mayors’ conference on “ready-to-go” infrastructure projects, representing an investment of $149.7 billion capable of producing an estimated 1.6 million jobs in 2009 and 2010:  http://www.usmayors.org/mainstreeteconomicrecovery/. Or to see video from mayors’ conference, go to http://usmayors.org/77thWinterMeeting/videolink.asp?video=Sunday/lunch/03_panel

A few other links you might find useful:
The Knight Center of Digital Excellence
Mayors’ conference
US Politics Today
Mayor Manny Diaz’ blog posting

The Knight Center of Digital Excellence is the first national, definitive, nonprofit resource center developed to help communities create sustainable open broadband networks. Formed through a partnership of OneCommunity and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Center is dedicated to creating connected communities.

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