Digging into Digital Equity with Paul Matthews

How can our communities adapt to an increasingly online world where broadband access, computing devices, and digital literacy are necessary to fully participate in society? This season of Public Hearing is tackling all things Digital Equity - from small towns to national organizations - to better understand the obstacles and pathways to achieving digital equity.

To kick us off, we’re talking with Paul Matthews (@PaulFMatthews on Twitter), lifetime Worcester resident and Executive Director and CEO of the Worcester Regional Research Bureau (@wrrbureau). In this episode, Paul and Josh set the stage for the season with a discussion on the current state of digital access in Worcester, including policy efforts, existing resources, ARPA funding, and more!

Public Hearing is a podcast from Action! by Design where we explore the unique challenges and opportunities facing Massachusetts' Gateway Cities as they work to create more equitable, liberated, and sustainable communities. Listen to all of our episodes at https://publichearing.buzzsprout.com/ and follow us on Twitter @PublicHearingMA to keep up to date on all things Public Hearing!

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Transcript

Joshua Croke (00:00):

Hello Worcester and the world you are listening to Public Hearing on WICN 90.5 FM Worcester's only NPR Affiliate Station, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm your host Joshua Croke. And on behalf of the Public Hearing team, we're excited to be back with a relaunch of Public Hearing, new brand expanded focus, while Worcester is still the driving force behind why we're here to share information and opportunities to make our home city more equitable, where everyone has the opportunity to thrive. We know there are similar and a lot of challenges in communities across Massachusetts as well as the nation. And people are doing some incredible work to address issues facing people in our communities, things that might influence our own action here in the heart of the Commonwealth. So we'll be expanding our focus and sharing stories across Massachusetts Gateway Cities, cities that share a similar history to Worcester, Lowell, Springfield, Pittsfield, New Bedford.

Joshua Croke (00:52):

The list goes on. So here's the new pitch. Public Hearing is a podcast from Action! by Design, where we explore the unique challenges and opportunities facing Massachusetts Gateway Cities as they work to create more equitable, liberated and sustainable communities. Each episode will bring you stories from the front lines of community change work, featuring the people and organizations working to make a difference in their communities. We'll delve into issues like affordable housing, accessible transportation, equitable education, and more. We'll hear from experts and community leaders about the innovative solutions they're creating to address these challenges. But it's not all serious business. We'll also be bringing you some laughs and levity along the way because we believe that creating a more equitable world can and should be a joyful act. So join us on this journey to build better communities. Whether you are a policy wonk, a community organizer, or just someone who cares about creating a more fair and just world, this podcast is for you.

Joshua Croke (01:49):

So hit subscribe and let's get to work. Learn more about the show at publichearing.co. This season, we're focused on closing the digital divide and ensuring everyone in their communities has access to reliable internet, devices and resources to learn how to effectively use these tools to access everything from healthcare to education to job opportunities. We're kicking off our season on digital equity with Paul Matthews, the Executive Director and CEO of the Worcester Regional Research Bureau since 2019. Before coming to the Bureau, Paul led the 495 Metro West Partnership and served as the Worcester Regional Chambers Director of Government Affairs and then State Representative Harriette Chandler's, chief of Staff. He has been appointed to serve as a member of Governor Healey's Broadband and Digital Equity Working Group and by previous governors to do a bunch of other stuff that we’ll include in Paul's bio in our show notes.

Joshua Croke (02:42):

He's been honored as a Worcester Business Journal “Forty Under 40” award winner, recipient of the MetroWest Regional Collaboratives Regional Spirit Award, and CMRPC’s Community Leadership Award. He holds degrees from Colby College in government and biology and was selected in a national competition to be a Ford Foundation Fellow on Regional Sustainable Development. And I could go on. Beyond his professional responsibilities. Paul is a Worcester resident, a graduate of the public schools, who is an- who's active in a number of community organizations and has two teenage children. Wow. Paul, lots of great stuff. Following that written bio that I always read for guests, I invite folks to share any additional information about themselves, their identity or social location, anything you feel might be helpful, um, to give our listeners a bit more insight into you and your connection to the topics that we may explore today. So Paul Matthews welcome and thank you for joining us on Public Hearing. Anything you'd like to briefly add about yourself before we dive in?

Paul Matthews (03:42):

So just like to say thank you for the opportunity, Josh, and thank you for focusing on digital equity, uh, in this season. And I, I do want to add a lifelong Worcester resident and, uh, thus someone who really cares about the long-term future of our community. And I was honored to be asked by the Research Bureau in 2019 to be its third executive director and our mission is to do objective database research on complex topics like this to help inform the public. And this is a great opportunity to do that. So really appreciate the opportunity.

Joshua Croke (04:12):

Absolutely. Thanks so much for being here. One of my driving principles as like a designer and a facilitator, is to use data to inform and, and not dictate cuz there's a relationship between the community and data and information and how that's accepted, embraced, and utilized for different program development and addressing challenges. So I so value the work that the Research Bureau does to bring information and data to the community and kind of present this, this handoff to say, here's information and now do with it, uh, what you will. Uh, so thanks so much for, for being here and I wanna start with a little bit of a better understanding of some of the terms and definitions that will be helpful for folks tuning in as we move through this season on digital equity. So before even diving into like defining digital equity and what that means, what are some of the terms folks should be aware of as we're talking about internet access and these issues?

Paul Matthews (05:13):

So a couple things, Josh and number one, I I I think everyone understands the importance of access to the internet in this day and age. But, you know, while our smartphones are tremendously versatile and give us a lot of access, they're not great tools to use. As, as you know, for video conferencing, whether you're doing it for work or school or a medical appointment or something else, uh, broadband access allows far better quality of your internet access. And if you're in a household, for instance, several of you can enjoy internet access of a high quality if you're using broadband versus a cellular signal. Um, so hopefully that that helps. The, the other technical terms that people don't always follow are download and upload. So when you do a speed test of your internet connection, cuz there's ways to do that online, typically it gives you the download speed and the upload speed.

Paul Matthews (06:06):

Before the pandemic, the download speed was really the operative term. Everyone looked at, they were downloading movies, they were downloading, uh, audio clips, uh, you know, albums, et cetera. It was all download except for gamers who are actually using the upload speed to go back and forth. With the advent and the huge switch to video conferencing, what ended up happening is upload now becomes tremendously important because that's part of the video conferencing feature. So, uh, upload speeds are a critical factor and they really weren't as important in 2019. So that's a quality of service issue that's not always well understood by consumers.

Joshua Croke (06:46):

And when we're talking about device access, it, it's my understanding that there were a large number of folks who were accessing the internet only on their mobile devices. Is that right?

Paul Matthews (06:58):

Yes, and particularly, uh, you know, going into the pandemic, uh, as we all know, we all had to respond very quickly and, uh, make due in a lot of cases with what we had. And in some cases you had people, um, you know, who lost their jobs and were looking to pay rent and pay a whole host of other medical expenses, rent, food, et cetera. When we're all hunkered down in a lot of cases, people who were getting their broadband access from our cable provider Charter Spectrum sometimes had to sacrifice and, and terminate their cable connection cause they couldn't afford the bill on a monthly basis compared to everything else. Now, unfortunately, what ends up happening is the cable access in Worcester is the predominant means of getting broadband access. Uh, it should be added, uh, Charter Spectrum has a contract with the city or cable services, right? So cable tv, that's the subject of their contract with the city. It's just when they install the cable network throughout the city as a business opportunity, they develop the opportunity to provide internet access as well through broadband. And so that's separate from their contract with the city. I know there's, there can be confusion over whether or not the city controls the broadband access as part of that contract. They do not. That's just a secondary product. Charter Spectrum offers the public,

Joshua Croke (08:24):

Right. And, and, and that's something that I think might be helpful for folks to understand as well is like, what is the relationship between municipalities and corporations like Charter Spectrum and what does that look like here in Worcester and what does that relationship look like in other communities? Because I know that for a lot of folks, Spectrum is our only option for accessing internet in Worcester, but that's not always the case.

Paul Mattthews (08:50):

Yeah, it's not. If you go to Boston for instance, there's a number of providers. It's not just limited to a cable provider. So here in Worcester, um, Charter Spectrum has been the cable provider, uh, for my lifetime. Um, and the way that works is, uh, periodically they have to renew the contract with the city. And the city examines operations examines performance and determines whether or not they want to move forward with another contract cycle with Charter Spectrum to provide cable services to the residents. Now, for instance, this is a year 2023 when the cable contract is up for renewal. So there have been some public meetings about it where residents are complaining about their broadband service, but that's not subject to the terms of that contract. That is a separate product that Charter Spectrum provides. But we have an example in neighboring Shrewsbury of a completely different model, which is Shrewsbury has a municipal light and electric company. So that municipal light and electric company went into providing cable services in the 1980s. So as they developed cable, they essentially operate the cable service in Shrewsbury, the way Charter Spectrum does here. Likewise, they invested not only in, in, in broadband, put in fiber optic, uh, service to connect their households at a very high rate of speed. So Shrewsbury, as a result, has a different operating structure that the residents have, uh, cheaper and a higher quality service. As a result, it's a municipal utility.

Joshua Croke (10:26):

So if I'm understanding this correctly, if Con-considering the internet service offering by Spectrum is not in the kind cable contract with the city, if Charter just decided to stop providing internet access, Worcester would just be like disconnected.

Paul Matthews (10:44):

Well, there is good news, uh, in theory Charter Spectrum where Charter Spectrum provides service. If they shut down, they would not be, uh, uh, uh, secondary type provider. That, that being said, I I think we all recognize that this in Charter Spectrum self-interest to continue providing service cuz they're, as we all know, who pay for broadband service. You are paying for the privilege and that's a pretty substantial, uh, revenue opportunity for Charter Spectrum. That's why they made those investments. Our first report, as you point out back in 2020 when the pandemic hit, illustrated, that a number of communities have found that when you have a, a monopoly structure like that and one predominant model, there's very few places in the city that have, um, any, any other opportunity to get broadband service other than Charter Spectrum. Communities that have more than one provider find that typically pricing improves and quality service improves because there's a level of competition between the two services trying to get subscribers.

Paul Matthews (11:46):

In this case, the good news is Verizon, uh, it's not very well known, but Verizon embarked in 2022, on beginning a citywide buildout of a fiber optic network not to provide cable. Verizon is not planning to compete against Charter Spectrum, but if you look at the business model now, uh, most households, especially under a certain age, aren't subscribing to cable. They're using streaming services. So the network they're installing in Worcester, Verizon is intended to eventually be citywide and provide voice and data services. So they started in 2022. Uh, my understanding is they looked at the southwestern part of the city for the first phase, and they understandably are having to move in phases given we're the second largest city in New England. So my understanding is that first phase, um, is nearing completion. And then we're gonna move to another section of the city. So Verizon is embarking on a substantial investment in Worcester that should provide an alternative to all of us, uh, for broadband service.

Joshua Croke (12:50):

And I want to jump into some of the work of the, the Research Bureau and the reports and, and the output from that and act like actions that have been taken within the city in a moment. Um, but for listeners, cuz this, now we're starting to get into some of the areas where digital equity is, um, is present, right? Access, who has it, who doesn't, uh, how fast is it, is it reliable, et cetera. So for our listeners, could you give a a definition or kind of an overview of the digital equity conversation that is, is catalyzing a lot of this work?

Paul Matthews (13:24):

Sure. And, uh, in, in terms of going into the pandemic, right, this was a national and statewide conversation here in Massachusetts about the need for broadband access. Largely though in rural areas because rural areas that are not dense weren't really on the, uh, because the lack of density and the high cost of installing the infrastructure, they tended to be at the bottom of the list for receiving broadband service. So nationally, a lot of federal attention was at encouraging development broadband in rural areas as well as here in Massachusetts for the last 20 years, uh, throughout administrations, there's been a focus on trying to improve broadband service in Western Massachusetts where the state's density is lowest and it's rural. That being said, going into the pandemic, there is growing national recognition that, oh my goodness, urban areas have a real disparity too for a whole host of reasons.

Paul Matthews (14:21):

Some are economic, I talked about people who lost their jobs and had to make difficult decisions on paying for services. Rent, food and medicine, somewhat understandably were higher in the priority list for many than paying for a cable bill. Likewise, there are other issues in urban communities, including, um, we have a substantial amount of people who might move around and not stay in one particular apartment or domicile for long enough to subscribe to services. We also have, you know, a significant amount of three deckers and, uh, dense housing where the owner or landlord might not consent to having broadband access installed, leaving the residents in a difficult position to secure those services. So the urban areas nationally at the beginning of the pandemic were starting to be viewed as areas that needed critical attention and investment. And we did our report in 2020 in an effort to illustrate what was going on here in Worcester in that it was in fact a broadband divide.

Paul Matthews (15:24):

We've continued to update the data. So for instance, Josh, you well know cuz we've talked about it. The Bureau publishes an almanac of Worcester data every year. So our most recent almanac published in 2022 was able to use federal data. There is a time lag, so it's from 2020. So the first year of the pandemic, it showed that, um, about 20, uh, 6% of city households did not have broadband access. Um, so 83% had broadband access and that comes out to be about 11, almost 12,000 households lacked internet subscriptions. Now think about the fact that in the pandemic the Worcester Public Schools were virtual, there was an immediate impact educationally as well as, uh, socially, economically, culturally and everything else. Um, so that was the situation the city and school department and community were facing when the pandemic hit in 2020.

Joshua Croke (16:25):

And so quick historical context for listeners, and you've mentioned the, the report in, uh, 2020, the Research Bureau did a report called Broadening Broadband, um, that provided a lot of information and context around the conversation that we're having, such that the city created a municipal broadband task force to investigate improvements to broadband infrastructure. Can you talk just kind of quickly about additionally some, additional findings in the work of that task force? And then I want to kind of use that to transition to your April 22 report on Boosting Broadband. Um, and by looking at, you know, more data, examining connection speed, talking about student access, because that's such a critical piece. And we in the past have done season specifically around educational equity and have talked about the challenge of young people accessing, um, internet accessing devices. And we'll also kind of be covering throughout this season on digital equity, what we found in our research to be referenced as like the three legs of the stool as it relates to digital equity, which is the actual broadband access, but also access to devices and then digital literacy and training and learning and resources for how to, how folks can use these tools.

Joshua Croke (17:37):

And we know that there are racial and ethnic disparities present in the data around accessing all of those things, um, in addition to other kind of marginalized communities and groups being able to access these resources. So that's quick historical context, but want to jump back quickly, Paul, to to hear from you around some of the work of that task force and you know, kind of the perspective from from then till where we are now.

Paul Matthews (18:02):

So I'll try to be succinct cuz a lot's happened obviously, uh, since the pandemic first hit. So to the city's great credit, they immediately established a sort of a working group of different people engaged in responding to the broadband crisis, uh, you know, uh, within city and school departments. So they pulled us into that conversation as we were developing our first report. We made a series of recommendations. Josh and I, I appreciate pointing them out, but one of them was the city should establish a more formal building on the informal efforts, establish a more formal group that pulls together all the various operational signs of the city and school department and key stakeholders to talk about how do we address the broadband access difficulty in an urban area like Worcester. So, um, I, I have to give kudos. The city council, uh, he us come in and present to the technology committee at the time, led by council, then Councilor Wally, um, he championed the city, uh, creating a, uh, Municipal Broadband Task Force.

Paul Matthews (19:02):

And, uh, he and the mayor worked with then City Manager Ed Augustus. To create the task force. Uh, we also presented to the school committee, and you know, from your work, Josh, the, the school committee and Worcester Public Schools were tremendously concerned about this, and to their great credit made it a huge priority during the pandemic. So the school committee likewise supported the establishment of the group and a lot of our recommendations calling for state attention to help Worcester. So they ended up establishing a group, um, led by, at the time the Head of the Office of Urban Innovation, Eric Batista, our new city manager. So Eric's the one who really, uh, led the establishment of the group. And then our first meeting we heard from Senator Markey what was happening in Washington as a federal response and how the city could, um, best position itself as those deliberations continued.

Paul Matthews (19:52):

So what they ended up doing was pulling in, uh, a large group of internal stakeholders, everyone from, uh, you know, the IT office, the Worcester Public Schools, the Development Office, the Legal Office, uh, a whole host of experts in city, in school department side, as well as the Chamber of Commerce, uh, UMass Memorial, UMass, ME, Chan Medical School, uh, fortunately the Bureau and WPI. And so for, uh, the beginning phase of the work WPI, I provided some tremendously helpful, um, technological, uh, counseling and perspective on some of the issues at work in the city of Worcester affecting this. While the Bureau provided some context and perspective on the policy issues and opportunities affecting us. So, um, as part of that, we working with the group, we decided to make it a priority to issue another report. Uh, so we worked on it in the fall of 2021 and released it at the beginning of the spring of 2022 to talk about what was happening on a state and federal level because attention had really shifted on the federal level to providing funding for responses and then to the state as well.

Paul Matthews (21:04):

So we were really able to set the stage for continued state attention to this in this second report and update people on what was happening in the city, which is broadband access. They go up a little bit, um, going into 2020. However, a lot of it was due to access to handheld devices. People were using their phones as nodes in, that's not a, a good long-term solution for video conferencing or a lot of the high upload download speeds that are required. It's an interim solution, it's a bandaid. So we are able to really help continue informing that conversation. And I'll add lastly, we did do a forum where we brought in the two top people on the state level and Undersecretary of Economic Development, Ashley Stolba and the head of the Massachusetts Broadband Institute to talk about what was happening on a state level, uh, to support communities like Worcester.

Joshua Croke (21:57):

Great. And, and to quickly point out some of the, um, economic disparities and access as well, the report kind of shares that in, I think this is pulling from 2019, uh, data that 61% of low income households had access to broadband, uh, connection at home compared to over 93% of households earning more than $75,000 annually. And so as we're jumping into this series, and we're already at about our five minute time limit here, um, but as we're diving into this series for listeners, we are gonna be exploring these disparities and programs, resources and opportunities for folks to get involved and connected to resources, to, to close that divide. And, and we're, we are talking about, um, closing the digital divide here as well. And so Paul, in our, in our kind of remaining minutes here, I have a couple questions around some updates in in Worcester based on, on your knowledge. So I know that at the time of the report, the city manager had, um, made a investment plan of almost 6 million of ARPA funding. Did that investment happen and what does, um, kind of the sustainability plan for that, um, those those needed resources look like as we are running out of that ARPA bank?

Paul Matthews (23:15):

Yeah, so I know what the city, um, has been doing and one of the things our second report pointed out is, um, the city's been investing in an ongoing effort to provide, uh, high capacity wifi and public places in an effort to help provide remedies in short-term solutions to people who need the access. So, uh, we do have a list in the report and most Worcester parks at this point are wired. A lot of other public spaces. As I reference Verizon is coming in with a full, uh, network scale investment citywide. That's something the city's been working on very, uh, to make a priority to provide additional options for service, which as we've talked about, should lead to quality and pricing improvements. In the meantime, what ended up happening is on the federal level, money flowed, uh, to the city and the state set aside 50 million for a broadband fund in an effort to help communities like Worcester, particularly urban areas dealing with this problem.

Paul Matthews (24:11):

And then towards the end of last year, they made another infusion into that, seeing how high demand was going to be. So the program we ran a few months ago brought in the two top state officials to talk about. There's, there's two programs they're running. One is to try to, um, find regional scale partners to help, um, catalyze, uh, community responses to this. The other is helping municipalities with digital equity efforts. They also set up this, um, Broadband and Digital Equity Advisory Group that's statewide. And I was honored to be asked to participate to provide the Bureau perspective on the challenges facing Worcester and other gateway cities. So we've had our inaugural meeting with the Secretary of Economic Development, Secretary Hao, who is a very dynamic take charge leader and left, no, uh, left it quite clear that this is a priority for her in the Healey Administration, which is tremendously reassuring. So the the fact is although the ARPA funds right, were initiated on a local level, there's also funding flowing from the federal to the state and then to the local level. So there are additional funds coming that the city can utilize to try to help guide and identify the digital equity issues at work in the city around census tracts and other clusters in the city that are having ongoing problems.

Joshua Croke (25:28):

Thank you for providing that context. And in our last, like under a minute, Paul, I want to throw in like this notion that access to the internet should be considered a human right. What are your thoughts on this and what do you feel are some practical steps that might move us in, uh, that direction?

Paul Matthews (25:45):

So, uh, couldn't agree more. It's an essential service. I, I think that what's happening is a game-changing moment where funding is flowing and for the first time in my memory, cities are being recognized as areas of need for broadband access and what Worcester’s done to have this community-based conversation, but have municipal and school department leadership make a priority is critical.

Joshua Croke (26:10):

We've been talking to Paul Matthews, Executive Director of the Worcester Regional Research Bureau to kick off our series on digital equity. Paul, in under 20 seconds. What is something you hope folks are taking away from today's conversations and what do you think, what do you hope they'll do with this information?

Paul Matthews (26:26):

One thing I didn't mention, there is a federal subsidy that was set up that people should look into accessing to defray the expense of having broadband service. Uh, it's called, uh, the Affordable Connectivity Program. And if you call Charter Spectrum and tell 'em you're interested in finding out if you're eligible, they will help, help you. There's also information online, so please check it out if, if, if you think your broadband service is too expensive, if you can't afford it, look into the Affordable Connectivity Program.

Joshua Croke (26:53):

Awesome. Paul, thank you so much for joining us. We will include links to follow Paul and the Research Bureau in our show notes. So check those out, share this episode with your friends, talk about it at the dinner table, all that good stuff. And thank you listeners for listening to Public Hearing, our podcast and radio show that airs Wednesdays at 6:00 PM on WICN 90.5FM, Worcester's only NPR Affiliate Station and can be heard wherever you listen to podcasts. Our show seeks to amplify stories of community efforts working toward equity, justice, and joy across Worcester, Massachusetts, Gateway Cities and the Nation. I'm your host, Joshua Croke, founder of Action! by Design, a mission-driven consultancy supporting community growth and change through the transformative power of creative arts, media, and design. Learn more about our work, including this show at actionbydesign.co. Our audio producer is Giuliano D’Orazio, who also made our show music. Thank you to our production team, Kellee Kosiorek and Jack Tripp, who also make this show possible. And if you would like to help make this show possible, check us out at publichearing.co. The work continues folks. Thanks for listening.