BALTIMORE (WJZ) — Baltimore City officials held an lawsuit astatine Gilmor Homes connected Thursday to motion up residents successful Housing Authority of Baltimore City units for escaped broadband net and to administer computers and devices for access.
The net work is portion of a national program, Emergency Broadband Benefit, created to assistance low-income Americans enactment connected during the COVID-19 pandemic. HABC residents tin take their provider.
The group PCs for People besides distributed hundreds of escaped refurbished computers, galore of them being aged machines from section authorities agencies that were past refurbished.
“Lack of entree to exertion for distant work, virtual learning, and telehealth continues to undermine the imaginable of our communities,” Mayor Brandon Scott said successful a statement. “The pandemic whitethorn person exacerbated the integer divide. It is imperative that we stay laser-focused connected ensuring that each City residents are connected to the net and person entree to a device. The HABC Resident Connect lawsuit is an illustration of the value of public-private partnerships successful Baltimore. It volition instrumentality each of america to enactment to adjacent the integer disagreement and present these important exertion resources to Baltimoreans.”
In 2020, Scott signed a memorandum of knowing with PCs for People to springiness the enactment retired municipal computers alternatively than nonstop them to the landfill.
In February, Scott and the Baltimore City Office of Information and Technology announced plans to cod and donate much than 900 computers oregon instrumentality to low-income students and families.
Founded successful 2008 successful St. Paul, Minnesota, PCs for People estimates that it has distributed restored computers to 300,000 radical and helped 120,000 households link to low-cost internet.