A conversation with Kyla Williams Tate - Director of Digital Equity Cook County

[00:00:08] Speaker A: Welcome to closing the digital divide, the podcast dedicated to creating meaningful conversations and sharing valuable insights from industry leaders, policymakers, equipment manufacturers and others on closing the digital divide. I'm your host, Charles Thomas, and together we will explore the policies, challenges, triumphs, and innovative solutions that are reshaping the digital landscape. On this episode of closing the digital bite, we're going to learn more about what's going on in Cook County, Chicago. And to do that, I'm going to bring our guest on. Our guest today is Kyla William Tate, who is the director of digital equity in Cook County, Chicago. Kyla, welcome to the show. How are you today? [00:00:58] Speaker B: I'm doing well. How are you? [00:01:00] Speaker A: I am doing excellent. After my short episode of having to deal with COVID there, we're back on the circuit again. Kyla. Cook county is the nation's second largest county by population, and you guys, in 2015 made a significant investment of over $150,000,000 in it innovation. And in 2023, Cook county released its plan to improve digital access in marginalized communities across in marginalized communities in Cook counties. And from what you tell me, actually across the entire county, first of all, welcome to the show and tell us a little bit about what you guys are doing in Cook county. [00:01:50] Speaker B: So in Cook county, we are really building our digital equity ecosystem. When I was appointed to this job in June of 2022, what became really clear to me is that because of our geography, because of the makeup of our populations and communities, that people were doing the work, but that they were not connected to others who were doing the work. So lots of folks working in silos, lots of lost opportunities to leverage investments, and just some systems that are in place in reference to digital access, digital skill building and infrastructure that are gap areas and hindrances to us advancing digital equity goals. So a big piece of my job, especially in the first 18 months, has been to really discover what our digital equity ecosystem is. Who are the champions, who are the folks who've been doing this work for a very long time and figuring out how we directly connect with residents to hear from them what their digital equity challenges are and what some of those successes are that maybe we can utilize to replicate in other places so that we can get as much data as possible around our digital equity landscape. [00:03:22] Speaker A: So as you went through this process, you must have discovered some historical challenges that had to be overcome to get to a place where you guys are today. Can you talk to us a little bit about that? [00:03:39] Speaker B: Right. So if you've heard President Prep Winkle, who's our Cook county board president speak about this issue. She references something that I think a lot of communities can relate to. We've done a really poor job of acknowledging Internet as a utility. And once we did not do that, it allowed for private companies with profit aims to determine connectivity in our communities. And there were decisions that were made that providers were permissed to put fiber and other connectivity devices or processes in communities where they believed the people could afford to pay for them. So when you're making digital equity decisions around a profit model, certainly it leaves those who need the connectivity the most and have the affordability and access challenges, leaves them from being able to connect. And so when we look at our excuse, my phone is ringing for some od reason, but when we look at our map, our digital equity map across Cook county, we can clearly see why the gaps are the way they are and where those gaps exist. President Prepickel also talks about the same map. So when we look at the map to determine economic development opportunity, it's the same map. When we look at the map to determine holistic health solutions, it's the same map. So there's just been systemic disinvestment across the county, and it has left significant gaps. But we believe we are operating really from a hope perspective and a strength based perspective for this work that if we could solve for digital equity in our communities, that that may actually be a pathway for solving for many other equitable opportunities in Cook county. So we're looking at it as digital equity not being just a pathway to information, but being a solution set for how we really address the disparities that exist in our marginalized communities or marginalized neighborhoods within communities, because that's a thing. [00:06:21] Speaker A: So as you guys kind of came through, or as you seen some of these discoveries, how did the industry folks respond to the discoveries that you guys made, that you saw gaps? Were they receptive? Were they interested in partnering with you guys to help move forward, to help you guys solve some of these issues? [00:06:54] Speaker B: Absolutely. So let me talk you through what we did. So, summer of 2023 was a busy summer. We launched our community outreach and engagement process for digital equity, which was inclusive of a community based survey that we offered both digitally as well as in paper form through partnerships with our community libraries. We also did a series of community conversations. We had twelve community conversations, ten in person and two virtually so that we could speak directly to residents and business owners, and school teachers, and librarians and moms and grandmamas who all had words to share and stories to share around how digital equity is impacting their particular communities or households or places of business. And we learned a lot our survey. And if for anyone out there who's ever done a community based survey, you know, you want to try to get it to the length where you will not have such a high abandon rate because folks start answering questions and they're like, I got to answer how many more questions? And then they abandon the survey. So we were trying to figure out what was the right length of the survey, but we decided that because this was our inaugural effort and we really didn't have enough information directly from Cook county residents that we just had to ask them the questions. And the survey ended up being a little longer than what we intended. But we were pleasantly surprised. People were passionate about sharing their particular stories, their particular set of circumstances, their particular challenges with connectivity, with access to skills, to having low quality devices and many other kind of antidotes that came from the survey. And those community conversations we had over, you leave at the survey, like, do you have anything else to share? And you don't make that a required box because people normally don't have anything else to share. Well, we received over 5000 comments on those optional sections specifically, again, sharing stories and people telling us exactly things that have happened to them in their journey for connectivity, personal and otherwise. So we had a lot of information and what we've been doing is meeting with our industry partners, our providers of connectivity services, our providers of refurbished devices or device donation to ensure that one, they understand what the community is saying. Because what we're doing is amplifying resident voice. That is the priority for digital equity, is that it's not government policy. It's not government policy alone. It is government policy that is influenced strongly and directly through resident voice. So we shared with our partners what we have heard, and they acknowledge that there has been some challenges in Cook county in reference to their availability of service, their reliability of service, and their investment into helping to build the digital ecosystem here. So we, as a result of that, have created a subcommittee that's called our infrastructure and Ecosystems partner subcommittee that will be made up of the isps, other community network providers, as well as our philanthropy, as well as our corporate partners that are interested in this work, so that we together can collaborate and build solutions that support the recommendations that we've laid out in our digital equity action plan. [00:11:24] Speaker A: So as you guys went through this process and you've kind of gotten to a point where you've gotten all these groups together, are there specific initiatives that have come out of that that are implementable and that you guys are doing today, or is that still on a planning timeline? [00:11:52] Speaker B: Yeah. So our digital equity action plan is a framework plan. It provides the opportunity to discover what we learned about our county and a set of recommendations that we believe if we enact them appropriately, we will advance digital equity in our county. Currently, I am working on a companion piece to that plan, which will be the implementation plan that takes the twelve impact solutions and turns them into twelve work streams. And underneath each of those work streams will be programs, initiatives, and other opportunities for us to engage with community, build partnership, and advance those digital equity goals through those activities that are named in those work streams. So we are hoping to have our implementation plan available in March of this year. The other thing that I would like to mention is that when we released our plan in October of 2023, during Digital Inclusion Week, which was super important for our county to recognize, because we passed a resolution that acknowledges the first business week of October as digital Inclusion Week. So going forward, we will always participate in digital inclusion Week. But when we released our plan, we also released a companion outreach tool. We took information that was provided through the American Community Survey, that data for around Cook county, around connectivity, and we created an index for each of our community based on socioeconomic factors. So in addition to the plan and having all of the things that the plan entails, we also have a companion map where you can actually search your community or your place of business and determine what the digital equity index score is to show where we are trying to move each of the communities. Right. So there are some communities that have high scores, but there are some communities that have very low scores, and we're trying to move those scores in the positive direction by standing up these twelve different work streams. [00:14:25] Speaker A: So your state has been very much on the forefront with the NTIA Bead program. Yes. Are you guys tying that into your initiatives as you move forward, or talk to me a little bit about how that works or how you guys have at least looked at that process? [00:14:50] Speaker B: That's a great question. Thank you for asking. So, we have been very intentional on the county level to be connected to what's happening on the state level. So I have an advisory committee called the Council of Digital Equity, which is code for short. And on my code, the membership body consists of not only local leaders, statewide leaders, but national leaders. In this space, on the code, our director of the Illinois Office of Broadband, Matt Schmidt, sits, and many of his team members also attend those code meetings and contribute to those code meetings. Recently, the state of Illinois, as part of the NTIA process for the bead funding had to release its draft plan for comments and for review. Our plan, our Cook County Digital Equity Action plan is cited in their plan. And there are direct sightlines from the work that we've identified as priority for Cook county residents that show up in that statewide plan. Additionally, for folks that live outside of Illinois and outside of Cook county, they may not understand that we have a really interesting governance structure to our northeast portion of the state. So Cook county, albeit, has governance over Cook county generally. The city of Chicago has its own governance structure with its mayor, its own departments and all of that. They too also have a action plan for Chicago around digital equity. And so when we were creating our plan, we looked to the Chicago plan to not only acknowledge the great work that they did in their outreach, but we also consumed some of that information from Chicago and some of those strategies from Chicago to create our plan. So if you're looking at that continuum of digital equity strategy, it rolls from the city level, it then rolls into the county level, which is inclusive of all of those suburban counties. And then we roll up into the state level again. We've tried to be super intentional and also present a regional plan for others who don't have digital equity plans in their counties or in their regions to be able to use our plan as a reference. There are four activities that are in the plan that people can use to start conversations, whether at the government level or the household level, so that folks can start talking about it. And we wanted to be really instructional around that in our plan. So our plan, albeit is full of data and information, it is also super instructional. It's like a workbook. You can carry it around with you and use it while you're doing your work across the county. And then lastly, I'll end with, because we've taken a regional approach around our work. So it's not just those in Cook county, it's also those in our caller counties. Because we know, depending on what's happening in the housing market, you could live in Cook county today and Kane county tomorrow. You can live in Will county today and Cook county tomorrow. And we want to ensure that the pathways to access are clear, no matter if you are in the county currently or coming into the county in some future time. So we are working really diligently with leaders across our collar, counties that touch Cook county and our borders to ensure that we have a really strong regional approach. [00:18:53] Speaker A: And that is awesome. One of the things that I've discussed on other podcasts with other people. And just in general, the discussion on connectivity being one issue, but we're going to begin connecting people with Internet access that may have had either very limited or no access at all. Have you guys had discussions around training how you will teach people how to utilize the resources that they have? Right. And an example that I give is that someone may been biking to work for ten years. Now all of a sudden they have a vehicle that they can drive. [00:19:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:19:49] Speaker A: How do they drive that vehicle? Have you guys thought along those lines? And if you have, talk to us a little bit about initiatives to help people learn how to use resources now that they have connectivity. [00:20:04] Speaker B: Correct. So with government, we are not the direct service providers in our community. We have a big community of wonderful educational institutions, anchor institutions, and other community based organizations that have been doing this type of work and others who are interested in helping to aid in this work with their programming, because we know that general literacy and digital literacy really is the foundation for work, for education, even for joy. If you're just trying to surf the Internet to find that next recipe for Thanksgiving so you don't ruin the turkey no more, you need to be able to understand what it is to search and what's a safe site and all of those kind of deals. So we understand how important digital skills is to this process and to this movement. What we are trying to do is help, again, build our digital equity ecosystem, which means identifying, organizing, empowering, and helping to support those institutions and communities that are charged with doing this work. So there's two things that I wanted to highlight for you that I think would answer your question. The first is our Cook county libraries need love. They need love. They need support. They need resources. They need digital skills themselves as the leadership of digital hubs and communities. So we launched a program, a discovery program, earlier this month called libraries as digital hubs as an opportunity for us to understand the ecosystem of libraries. And every day, I'm learning something new about how our Cook county libraries operate, how they receive funding, the leadership structures, all of that. We are trying to discover and figure out where and how the county can be a resource to their systems and how they are able to offer more of what they are already doing. Because, again, our libraries are the folks that have navigators or have librarians that are tasked with helping our community members learn skills, and they're hosting skill building programming. And we want to make sure that our communities of libraries specifically has the resources necessary to do the things that they need to do. So we're discovering things, and we'll be rolling out data based off of what we discovered and then folding that into one of the solutions under our confidence cornerstone. So again, there's twelve recommendations that will have twelve work streams. Those twelve work streams and solutions roll up into four cornerstones. Accessibility, confidence, safety and infrastructure. So our digital equity ecosystem, learning ecosystem shows up in our confidence cornerstone. So that's our first kind of a first example of something we're doing to help build digital skills and community. The second thing that we're doing is really, again, empowering our leadership across the county, people who've been doing this work, who we were unaware of and were disconnected from this effort that we're doing. So we stood up a local group of champions when we started this work back last year, they were called the digital equity guiding team, but they've since formalized their name and they're now the digital equity action committee of suburban Cook county, or Deke for short. Deac. And the Deke is made up of a cross sectional representation, cross geographic representation of partners, anchor institutions or instructors of digital skills and communities. And they are creating movement and moments in their own communities and across communities of how to address digital skill gaps, how to address device gaps. And we're doing like events and all types of community conversations to help to strengthen the ecosystem and connect the dots so more communities have access to what's already there. Because that's a big part of this, is that a lot of people don't know what is available even in their own community. So we're using this group, the DEAC, as our megaphones to say, hey, community members, you can go to the library and do this, or you can go over to this CPO and do this, or you can go to your child's school to do this. We are gathering information and trying to formalize it and organize it in a way that's super consumable for all residents. [00:25:12] Speaker A: So it sounds like you guys have created some really proactive initiatives out there. You talked about having the workbook, and you did say you were recently put into this position, is that correct? Over the last. [00:25:34] Speaker B: Yeah, June of 2022 is when I was put into the position, yes. [00:25:38] Speaker A: So have you met any resource challenges? And if you have, how have you been able to overcome them? And that resources could be, obviously, people funding, just the ability to gather those isps or those carriers or whomever that would be out actually building your networks. Have you met any of those resource challenges? [00:26:13] Speaker B: So, I wouldn't say that I met them. I just knew that they existed because I've been doing this work for a very long time. Prior to me coming to the county in June of 2022, back in 2011, I was doing this work with an organization called the Smart Chicago Collaborative. It was a partnership between the Chicago Community foundation, the MacArthur foundation, and the city of Chicago. And we received the $15 million designation from the Broadband Technologies Opportunities program. And we understood that that $15 million wasn't going to go very far. So we created a sustainability model around that organization, that quasi organization, which turned our work from being just a two year project based on the management of those grant funds to a seven year project because we were doing a lot of digital inclusion work because there's such great need. So now let's fast forward to me being here starting in 2022. When the $15 million came into Illinois from BTOP, it didn't touch suburban Cook county at all. It was only for Chicago proper. So 20 years later, we did not receive any funding. And there hasn't been any designated funding that's come to the county level. Outside of infrastructure dollars that we've received from the state of Illinois and infrastructure dollars that we've invested ourselves as a matching partner, there hasn't been really any investment in digital equity or digital inclusion specifically at the county level. So I already was aware that there was a funding gap. But President Prattwinkle, back even before COVID in 2019, identified digital equity as a priority. And then the COVID came in 2020, which proved her right. Right. Because no one was prepared, and we had to do a lot of work across the county. Our partners and our households and individuals had to do a lot of work to not only keep themselves safe, but figure out how to participate in a digital society when a lot of them lack the access. So we're thankful to our libraries and our school districts and those, our device partners and those who really stepped up to help support Cook county in its time of need, as we were all managing COVID. But what that said was that we at Cook county have to ensure that we have funding available to not only address our current work, but to sustain this work going forward. So my digital equity planning has a $2 million designation from ARPA, but ARPA is going to end in 2026. So I can't create these twelve work streams and all the activities of things that are going to come underneath it and not have a way to sustain the work, not have a way to help to sustain our partnerships and communities that are responsible for doing the work and helping to collect the data and sharing the stories. So my biggest job in addition to organizing and strategizing and all of that is fundraising. And we need investment. The only way we are going to advance digital equity in Cook county is through significant, sustained investment. And that is the message that I am sharing with our partners. That is the message that I've shared with our executive team. That is the message that I'm going to continue to share with anyone who is willing to listen to me. [00:30:11] Speaker A: Well, that is awesome. This has been awesome. One thing I will say is that I really enjoy people's passion and your passion for what you guys are doing there in Cook county just jumps off the screen. People can't see it right now, but it's just jumping off the screen and I'm sure they can hear it in your voice. [00:30:36] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:30:37] Speaker A: Tell us how people can learn. Our audience, rather, can learn more about what you guys are doing, the great work that you guys are doing over there in Cook county. [00:30:47] Speaker B: Absolutely. So, one, I would encourage folks to follow our social media. So at Cook county gov on all platforms, we share out readily and consistently about many things happening in Cook county, which is inclusive of digital equity work. And you can also just go to your googles and just type in Cook county digital equity. It will draw you to our web page on our cook county website. And that's where our plan is, that's where our map is, and any other information or opportunities are listed there on that web page. I'm also on LinkedIn, so if folks just want to follow me on LinkedIn, it's under my name, Kyla Williams Tate, and I'll follow you back and we can connect there because this work is super important. And thank you for acknowledging my passion. I am passionate about this work and moving it need, but I can't do it alone. I need folks to join our digital equity ecosystem. Whether you're a contributor or consumer, we need you there. So if you're looking to get involved with this work or need more information about this work, especially if you are a resident, business owner or anchor institution, CBO, or piece of government that is in Cook county and you want to connect with me, please do that. I'm very reachable, approachable, and we're going to do this together. So we need you in this fight and in this movement. [00:32:22] Speaker A: Yeah, and I will echo that. No one individual or no one group can attack and help us to overcome this digital divide. It has to be a group effort. Kyla, I want to thank you again for joining us today, taking time out of your very busy schedule, as we just heard, and to our audience. Please get in contact with Kyla. She's doing some awesome work out there in Cook county. And again, we have to do this together, and we're excited to hear more about what you guys doing. And I want to extend an invitation for a little bit down the road that we get to come back and talk about some of the successes and challenges. There's always challenges as we move down the road, but we'd certainly like to hear more about what you guys are doing out there in Cook county as you guys move a little bit further down the road into your process. So again, thank you very much and we look forward to talking to you very soon. [00:33:34] Speaker B: Absolutely. Thank you.