Sun Times
By Michael Krauss
Sears Tower has a new antenna. Not the Sears Tower downtown, the original 100-year-old Sears Tower in North Lawndale. The antenna is part of a program to create Wireless Community Networks WCN’s offering wireless high-speed Internet access to four underserved, low-income communities in Illinois.
WCN’s are the brain-child of Chicago technology activist Robert Lieberman, CEO of the Center for Neighborhood Technology and Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn.
Thanks to Quinn and Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity Director Jack Lavin, the state is providing $200,000 in grant money to fund WCN’s in North Lawndale, Pilsen and suburban Elgin, and Downstate in West Frankfort.
“The idea of Wireless Community Networks is something we want to explore,” Quinn says. “This technology is the face of the future. We have to make it affordable and accessible.”
“All four of these areas are underserved,” Lieberman says, based on feedback from focus groups with local residents. The research demonstrates residents see a need for access to technology and would pay for the service if they could get an affordable price. Lieberman hopes to serve a minimum of 1,000 households per community at a monthly cost of $20.
Lieberman’s program brings together low-cost, recycled technology and local community organizations to provide training and support.
He’s teaming with the Homan Square Community Center Foundation and Neighborhood Technology Resource Center in North Lawndale and the Gads Hill Center in Pilsen.
“This is one of the most innovative projects we’ve seen,” says Deborah Strauss, executive director of the IT Resource Center, which provides technology guidance to more than 300 not-for-profit organizations. “To not put this technology into poor communities exacerbates the digital divide.”
Lieberman believes the commercial sector is just beginning to rediscover the purchasing power of low- and moderate-income communities. He hopes his initiative will demonstrate there is money to be made in underserved communities.
