Category: MunicipalNetworking

  • Radical Shift in Vision For Downtown

    Just got back from another presentation/planning charrette covering the Town’s new Downtown Development Action Plan and Framework. The plan, created with input from UNC, the Downtown Partnership, Downtown businesses and local citizens, is supposed to look at economic, cultural and social development opportunities over the next 5 to 8 years and layout a fairly structured […]

  • Raymond, Ready For Service: Formal Application

    Here is my formal application to fill Bill’s seat. I agree with recent Council comments that their new colleague must be “ready to hit the road running”. To do so, an applicant should be prepared, involved and experienced. Council already has a demanding workload. Over the next 7 months two major challenges – troubled finances […]

  • Municipal Networking: AT&T, Another Brick in the Wall

    I’ve been pushing for our local government to invest in community-owned networking as necessary infrastructure for the 21st century. Communities that provide neutral and widely accessible communications infrastructures will reap the benefits of greater economic activity, level the playing field vis-a-vis the digital divide and help create a new Town commons open to all our […]

  • Broadcast Localism: More Fun To Be Had…

    Chad Johnston just posted this over on OrangePolitics.org about this weekend’s Peoples Channel fundraiser (July 21st, Horace-William’s House, 6-8pm): Hey folks, Just wanted to give an update on this really cool event! Food and drink will be provided by: Benjamin Vineyard, Anathoth Community Garden from Cedar Grove, Cane Creek Farm Pork, Yugela’s treats, Matthew’s artisan […]

  • Broadcasting Localism, a People’s Channel Fundraiser

    As many of you know, I have a particular interest in employing technology to boost our citizens’ voices cost-effectively and in ways not otherwise possible. I met a kindred spirit in the The Peoples Channel’s director Chad Johnston many years ago when we both started attending the Town’s now defunct Technology Advisory Board to encourage […]

  • Municipal Networking: Eyes on the Road

    [SPRING CLEANING] I asked Town Manager Roger Stancil May 17th how the CCTV (closed-circuit TV) packaged in the Town’s first steps towards municipal networking (Municipal Networking:Could We Have a Little Less Big Brother?). Roger and Kumar Neppalli, our Town’s traffic (and now streetlight) point person, both clarified the bullet item. The CCTVs will be used […]

  • Downtown Internet Gets a Little Hotter?

    Ran into Bob Avery, the Town’s IT Director, on Franklin St. today. Turns out he’s surveying Downtown with an eye towards deploying a small pilot program of free Internet hot spots in the near future. The pilot would use Clearwire as the high-speed wireless backhaul. The only resources needed are power and location. I cautioned […]

  • Municipal Networking: St. Cloud Soars Above Chapel Hill

    As longtime readers and local voters know, I’m a strong advocate for bringing community-owned information infrastructure to Chapel Hill. Simply, to create a truly free new Town Commons benefiting our citizenry. I’ve been working the issue now for over three years – banging the drum of strategic economic stimulus, social improvement – bridging the “digital […]

  • Easthom Update on Chapel Hill WiFi

    In case you don’t subscribe to Council member Laurin Easthom’s ‘blog The Easthom Page, she has an update on some possible forward motion on implementing a municipal network. Updated staff report on wireless with council discussion is tentative but hopeful for April 23. Such a report will be pretty inclusive and give us the staff’s […]

  • Chapel Hill’s Public Forum on Information Technology

    If you would like to see our Town use technology to more effectively address social issues, improve operational efficiencies and drive the cost of doing government business down, then make a date to attend the rescheduled Public Forum on Information Technology 7-9pm Mar. 21st, 2007. The event will be held in the Conference Room of […]

  • Community Networking: Profiting from Poor Leadership Clearwire Gains a Toe-hold

    Profiting from Council’s continued inability to craft effective technology policy, Clearwire, a wireless Internet service provider utilizing proprietary spectrum, has gained a toe-hold in our community. These days, it’s hard to imagine getting through high school without the Internet. However, there are at least 100 students at East Chapel Hill High School whose families cannot […]

  • Municipal Networking: Nary a Citizen Advocate to be Found

    An update on the muni-networking task force prepared by UNC’s Shannon Howle Schelin, PhD, one of our stronger advocates for 21st century infrastructure. On November 13, 2006, an exploratory meeting was held at the Town of Chapel Hill to discuss the Town’s interest in pursuing a wireless strategy. The goal of the meeting was to […]

  • Easthom, Stancil Breath a Little Life Back into Municipal Network Initiative

    From Council member Laurin Easthom’s ‘blog The Easthom Page: At our last council meeting, I read the above history of wireless in town, and gave our new town manager, Roger Stancil, the opportunity to begin a process. He appointed a staff committee headed by Flo Miller to keep the process alive in exploring a municipal […]

  • DTH on WIFI: They have a point…

    From Sept. 18th’s Daily Tar Heel by kind permission of Mason Phillips. Nice to see a shout-out to my series on the poor decision to go with the proprietary lock-in NextBus system over an open-standards system. An alternative standards-based system could’ve delivered Internet access along all 23 transit routes – an alternative providing excellent penetration […]

  • Municipal Wifi: St. Cloud on Cloud Nine

    So let the naysayers and talking heads let fly, but the little secret that is secret no more is that the results of a carefully planned and deployed municipally owned system delivered free to the citizens as a public service is actually the most successful, beneficial and effective model in existence. So says Jonathan Baltuch, […]