Cruzio Stories: Santa Cruz at Work
Cruzio Stories is a bi-weekly podcast from Cruzio Internet, sharing short conversations with the people who make Santa Cruz tick — entrepreneurs, artists, community leaders, and creatives working out of the Cruzio coworking space. It’s not just tech talk — it’s real stories from the heart of a vibrant local community.
Cruzio Stories: Santa Cruz at Work
Episode 3: Equal Access: Building Digital Equity Across Santa Cruz
A teacher once told us her biggest worry was the kids who stayed off camera because their connection couldn’t handle video. When those families finally got a stable line, a parent said, “At least now my child can see you.” That simple moment captures why digital equity isn’t abstract—it’s about face‑to‑face learning, access to care, and a fair shot at opportunity.
On the latest episode of Cruzio Stories, hosted by James Hackett, COO at Cruzio, we bring together the leaders behind Equal Access Santa Cruz— Dr. Faris Sabbah from the County Office of Education, Susan True, CEO of Community Foundation Santa Cruz County, and Peggy Dolgenos, CEO of local ISP Cruzio—to share how a community moved quickly from crisis to action. You’ll hear how schools discovered more than a fifth of students without workable internet, why quality broadband matters far more than a checkbox on a coverage map, and how fixed wireless hubs, power redundancy, and smart upgrades pushed reliable connectivity to roughly 97 percent of students. We explore the ripple effects too: telehealth that saves time and expands behavioral health options, course access beyond district borders, and teacher‑guided, ethical use of new AI tools that prepare students for the future.
We also tackle sustainability. Early philanthropy and public grants lit the fuse, but federal subsidies have lapsed. Cruzio’s $5.65M “Summits to the Sea” project extends and upgrades service across San Mateo, Santa Cruz, and Monterey Counties, yet affordability pressures remain. We talk candidly about funding gaps, why a weak link isn’t good enough for modern school or healthcare, and how local giving and customer micro‑contributions can keep families online. If you care about digital equity, community resilience, and practical ways to help your neighbors thrive, this conversation is a field guide to building and sustaining quality broadband where it matters most.
Enjoy the episode and help us keep the momentum: subscribe, share with a friend who cares about connectivity, and leave a review telling us where access is still falling short in your neighborhood.
Hello everyone, I'm James Hackett from Cruz Io Internet here for a special edition of Cruz Io Stories. Excited to talk to some old friends about internet access and digital equity in our region. I'm here with uh Susan True, uh who is the CEO of the Community Foundation. Morning, Susan.
SPEAKER_02:Good morning, James.
SPEAKER_03:And uh Peggy Dalginus, CEO of Cruzo Internet. Hi, Peggy.
SPEAKER_02:Hi, everybody.
SPEAKER_03:And uh Dr. Farris Sabar, County Superintendent of Schools. Morning, Farris.
SPEAKER_00:Good morning, thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_03:Thanks everybody for being here. This is really the team that five or six years ago now started the Equal Access Santa Cruz Initiative. Um we right when the pandemic hit, we started this partnership between the Office of Education, uh, the Community Foundation, and Cruz I.O. because we needed to get more internet access to kids and families in the community. Um when we started, there were up to 85% of some families and kids in some school districts that didn't have adequate access. Since we established equal access, we've built dozens of internet distribution hubs serving world-class internet for very low costs, and we've connected thousands of families and students across the region. Um, starting with you, I just wanted to ask you at as you were so closely hit at the beginning of the pandemic, how did that lack of internet access impact students and schools?
SPEAKER_00:Well, when the pandemic, you know, we we had to transition very quickly when the and close down schools within a matter of of weeks, and had to really shift a lot of the learning experiences for students teaching and learning experiences to students online. And we quickly realized that that a large portion of our of our community, over a fifth of our students, did not have access to internet resources. And of course, these are uh families that live in rural parts of our community, families from low-income households. And it created, it it accentuated and exacerbated the equity issue for them because uh we were shifting everything to for these students to be learning uh all day online and for them not to have access or not and not necessarily to know how to use that, those resources, uh, meant that we had to move very quickly. And so we were uh felt there was an urgent equity issue that we needed to address right away to be able to increase the number, to really maximize the number of students that had internet access. And we also knew that we couldn't do that alone. And that's why we were so grateful for the Community Foundation and and for Cruz Io to partner with us to take that number, which at this point, uh if you look on DataShare, about 97% of our students and families now have access as a result of this amazing effort. And so uh it was something that we felt was was extremely urgent, and we moved very quickly with this partnership to to uh make sure that that we were addressing this digital equity challenge. That's great.
SPEAKER_03:Uh Peggy, as a we've been working on trying to get internet out to folks in the communities for many years, but when the pandemic hit, it really shone a light on it for other people from a position of a ISP who've been building out internet infrastructure and serving our community for so many years. What what was it at that time when we started equal access that that really was different and that really needed a different approach?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, we uh as an internet provider, we were very aware of the importance of Internet. I mean, we see startup uh companies all the time, extremely dependent on Internet. Uh the economy has Internet at its core these days. And of course, uh for elderly people who need medical services and for uh children who uh need to keep up in school, who are our future, that's our future doctors, our future lawyers, our future politicians, uh, we needed everybody in our community. We we still need everybody in our community to uh to be able to access Internet, what's what the Internet provides. And because we were providing it, we knew that there was inequity, and there still is. You know, it's still something that we need to work on. So when the pandemic happened, it was, you know, how people say that uh when the uh tide goes out, you see who's not wearing a bathing suit. Um so uh when the pandemic happened, it just became obvious to everyone what we'd been raising the roof for for years. And uh we're lucky that we have a community that recognized that. And uh government uh can help, but was very slow to do so. And so uh the community foundation was so key, and the local philanthropists that you know um understood, because a lot of them are technologists, that understood the need for internet and uh and were able to help us out through the community foundation and the school's participation, which meant that we could get it to people very quickly. And of course, Cruz I know, which has the uh we're local, we're nimble, I guess you'd say, um, and we have the latest technology that makes it very economical to provide internet to uh large numbers of people pretty quickly. And we were we were actually lucky because technology had uh had just kind of caught up a little bit to um to what we needed. So as the pandemic happened, just like Zoom was possible as the pandemic happened, which was very fortuitous that people could still work, uh at the same time, too, we were able to deploy very high-speed internet at a low cost to uh lots of students around uh our area. And uh and I'm so happy to hear those numbers. Uh you know, we we've worked so hard, and I'm glad to hear that the students are uh are catching up.
SPEAKER_03:Virus, did you can you give us any examples of the the kind of impact that better internet has on uh students that you that you work with?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I think that, you know, so many uh well I I gave some examples, I think, about when it comes to accessing resources. I I think about the the when we so much I would say that I I work with uh Salupa La Gente, which is a federally qualified health center, the largest in Santa Cruz County. And families as a result of the pandemic have many of them have gotten accustomed to telehealth type services. And so the ability for families to be able to access those those resources online quickly, um, I think has has been has really transformed a health care, uh some of the healthcare services that that are available. Behavioral health services are also being, you know, in many cases it's better for a student to see somebody in person, but in many cases that's not possible. And for them to have the opportunity to be able to connect with uh somebody and also increasing our capacity as a provider of healthcare services through the school system, uh, utilizing Internet resources is something that has been extremely important. And I do also think I when I think about what our youth have access to, being able to take a course at Stanford and or, you know, or some other uh other university, being able to, I think we have been able to amplify and open more doors for our students when it comes to learning. And we believe in customizing the learning environment and the learning resources to the needs of our students. And these resources absolutely do that. Of course, it needs to be guided by by our teachers and and you know, and and making sure that those that we're providing those resources in a safe way. But I think that what our students have access to in the transformation of AI tools as we think about how we're preparing our youth for the future, the the career uh opportunities and development, this is a central aspect of their learning experience. How to ethically and effectively utilize these resources is an absolutely necessary component of a young person's learning for the future. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01:And it helps our region be strong, our county be strong. And I think we have such an important role, and we always have uh, you know, Santa Cruz County has been very important in the technology area, and it it's so fraught, you know. There's uh a lot of bad actors. And I feel like that our area is a good actor, and that we should be strong, and that we should have a lot of people participating. We're a very creative area. Um we came up with a lot of the things that are being used now and sometimes abused. And uh I just think that all of us contributing and helping uh our students and our community to uh be able to function really well is just so important.
SPEAKER_02:And I would add, even at a more basic level, I just remember a teacher, I think it was at Radcliffe Elementary, um, saying that some of the children she worried the most about uh were their internet was so weak that they were just fading in and out off camera most of the time, just to stay online. And she thought, I was worried about these children before the pandemic. And now I can't even see their faces. And when um when those families got access, um, she told me about a conversation she had with a mother saying, At least now I'm confident that my child can see you. I mean, what a basic thing for a child to see his teacher. And um, and then we were able to um to bring internet access for the first time to agricultural worker housing. That was really exciting. I mean, they were things that were just so basic that we should be able to take for granted but couldn't in that time. So it's I think from the most aspirational um down to the very most basic. And they're and they're linked, you know? They are.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and we're still seeing a need, of course. The problem hasn't been solved as as we've talked about. We've made a lot of progress. Uh there were so many generous community members who donated to the fund, made such a huge difference in the early going. Then we started to see more funding coming down from the state and federal level that helped supplement some of the work that we were doing and support that. Now that's gone. The the the federal funding for for digital equity and supporting the affordable internet has has not been refunded. Um and there's still a need. We still we're setting folks up with equal access service every day. Um we still see areas that we need to expand to. Um Susan, do you still see that there's this is an ongoing issue in in your work in the community? And and do you think we can do more to continue to make sure people see that this is still an issue that we need to keep working on?
SPEAKER_02:Yes, we still have the Equal Access Fund um open to the public and ready to accept gifts to support more families having subsidized internet access. I think what's challenging in this time is that with cuts that will be coming to us based on uh Congress passing HR one and the president signing it, that we're going to see such extreme cuts in access to health care, oral health care. I mean, we're we are at a time when this community, all we have is each other right now. So it's time to pick the thing that you care about, whether it's access to health, whether it's legal support for families uh who are under threat of deportation, whether it's internet access, what you are passionate about, there is something to give to. A lot of needs coming in our community in the coming years. Competing, but also it's a way for us all to band together and to show our neighbors that we care.
SPEAKER_00:If I could add to that, I you know, and I I I absolutely agree that our families are need each other and need our community support more than ever. I also think that, you know, even though our connectivity numbers have really increased, broadband, quality broadband in connectivity like the kind that Cruz IO offers is still something that we can we we need to continue to provide to more families. So there may be connectivity, but there's differences in that the kind of connectivity we want. And we want to make sure that families have enough of that connectivity because the resources uh that they would have access to are going to increase significantly. As as uh I would say that that that as Susan mentioned, there's a very big difference between a weak connection and a good connection, and all the resources that we're describing are necessary. And so we absolutely have uh you know new families that are coming into our community. We are we have families that are still feeling isolated and in need of information and resources, and uh that we still have work to do to be able to reach um all of our families to ensure that they have quality, broadband internet connectivity to be able to utilize all of these resources to the maximum.
SPEAKER_01:And there's uh there's the question of we built a great network really quickly uh thanks to uh the people sitting here largely. Um but then you have to sustain that network. And as James mentioned, there were Federal funds coming down that were helping uh low-income families with their monthly costs. And now that's been cut off. And so, you know, Cruzo, we're doing our best to just kind of sustain everybody. Um, that is something that the Community Foundation Fund, the Internet Fund, contributes to is to try to take place of those subsidies that we're uh keeping people able to afford the internet. Um it's it is so interwoven. There are so many things uh because even as you lose money for other things, if you're uh losing money for Medi-Cal, for example, and then you don't have money for your children's internet, you know, like it's it is all uh all interconnected and so important.
unknown:That's right.
SPEAKER_03:And we've kept going with the equal access program, really was a game changer for Cruz AO, and we've taken the equal access brand, and we've been able to use the model that we built, and the community support has really been instrumental for us for getting other grant funding that's been available that we haven't been able to access in the past. We've got state grant funding and federal funding that's helped expand the program. Most recently, really, which has been up to this point the culmination of the work that we've been doing, uh Cruz Air was able to get a$5.65 million state grant to continue our equal access work. We called this project Equal Access Summits to the Sea, building out more and more of these fixed wireless hubs and upgrading some of the existing ones. As Peggy referenced, the technology keeps improving. So we were layering better technology, higher speeds, more power redundancy, more reliability onto all these uh new sites that equal access summits to the sea that that runs through San Mateo, Santa Cruz, and Monterey County. Um and we're just wrapping that project up here at the end of September. This week is really this today's a perfect day because we're our crews are in the field wrapping up the last of those builds. And we're already adding customers. We've added a couple of hundred folks to that new network and those new technologies already. So that that thank you again to the equal access team. It was really what we started uh back in 2020 that that's enabled us to get those additional funds and continue to work um building a better internet and making all of those new technologies available to folks of all income levels and all needs. At this point, just figure wrap things up with any closing remarks. I'll go around the table. And uh, Susan, do you have final thoughts on the equal access program and the importance of uh digital equity?
SPEAKER_02:I think my my big thought is just how encouraged and impressed I am about the what what this community can get done together. And I think that we can take those, the lessons from equal access and apply it to everything that's to come. I think we've done it numerous times, but in terms of um equity and equitable digital access, you know, to get to 97% of students have coverage feels really good. Making sure that it's good coverage will feel even better. So there's more to do. Um, but I don't think there's many communities that do the things that we do.
SPEAKER_03:Cyrus, same question and closing thoughts.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I just to second that and and just recognize that our families, many of our families need resources more than ever. Our mental health, we are still facing a mental health crisis. We are still uh our many of our families from mixed status backgrounds are are living in fear and needing legal resources and supports. And so the coming together of our local community in the same way that that was that that equal access uh really modeled, I think, is something that we need to continue to to uplift because it also not only um provides solutions, but also shows how our local communities have the resources and the initiative and and really the commitment to serve our community. So I see it as a model as as Susan has mentioned, and something that we could replicate so that we can continue offering more services to our community.
SPEAKER_03:It it really was that simple that when we came together, it was really just from folks in the community who knew each other getting together and saying we really just need to do what we're already good at here. And that was the recipe of equal access's initial success. Peggy, from Cruzeo's perspective, final thoughts on digital equity and internet access? Well, just no, you could talk all day.
SPEAKER_01:Of course. Internet is my business, so we could talk all day about it. But um again, I think I just want to echo that uh the community coming together has been uh such a rewarding thing, I think, for all of us to be part of. It's felt so good to help people get what they need. Uh you know, we didn't even get into the other disasters, the fires, the floods, uh, you know, and how uh Cruzio provided internet to uh the watchtowers, the rescuers. Um we have such challenges ahead of us, and I'm really glad to be working with the people in this community. I think we can really, you know, we can do it. We can we set our mind to it and we can do it.
SPEAKER_00:I'd like to just end with gratitude to to Cruz Io and the and the Santa Cruz Community Foundation. You're uh it's been an amazing partnership, and we're just really grateful for because I think we can we can see the results. Our families have benefited from this, and uh let's continue moving forward and and and making you know continuing to increase our the results that we're seeing.
SPEAKER_03:And as we wrap this up, just where can everyone reach you all for more information on what you do, Susan?
SPEAKER_02:Sure. You can take the old fashioned route and call in our office, which is 662-2000, or our website, CFSCC for Community Foundation, Santa Cruz County.org, and you'll see a give today button if you'd like to contribute to equal access.
SPEAKER_03:And Varis?
SPEAKER_00:We would encourage folks to go to our website, Santacruzcoe.org, and there is a whole section there for resources and information for for the community. And Peggy?
SPEAKER_01:Well, for Cruzio, we're Cruzio.com, and uh we actually have a program where our um where our customers can contribute a few dollars a month to uh low-income families who need internet access. And if you go to cruiseo.com, I think you can find it. There's you can do a search uh or just do or just contact us and say that you're interested in us in doing this.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, but cruiseo.com is where you can sign up for internet. Another great way to support this action is just sign up with a local internet provider, and everyone, every one of our customers' monthly fees helps to support the Equal Access Program. And to another link to get through to the Community Foundation to go to equalaccesssantacruz.com. All the information about the Community Foundation fund is linked there. And there's also some great case studies and histories of work that we've already done together. Thank you, Ferris, Peggy, Susan. Thanks for being here. Thanks for all of the work you do. And yeah, more to continue community action and partnerships like this for equal access and other needs that we need to address in the community. Thanks, everybody.