I’ve been asked to serve on the so-called “Executive Steering Committee” being organized by Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Alvarez to advise the county on its Wireless Miami-Dade initiative.
I had some serious talks with the Mayor’s office before they announced this, and tried hard to sell privacy and some other good things. Ordinarily, advisory bodies like this are mostly for show, but the Mayor’s advisors sure sound as if they really want to do the right thing — or at least know what it is.
The best online description of the committee that I could find is at W2i.org and says,
Who will serve on the Steering Committee?
Ira Feuer: We sent out invitations to high-level individuals in economic development, the clerk of courts, the government digital–divide area, department directors, higher education (University of Miami, Florida International University), the public education district representative, an Internet advocate from the University of Miami, OneEconomy, a community advocate (a bishop), an individual supporting regionalization among Miami-Dade, West Palm Beach, and Broward Counties, the head of tourism, and representatives from four municipalities and the Dade County League of Cities.
What is the Committee’s charge?
The steering committee will promote countywide connectivity, discuss wireless networking, and form recommendations for applications in various policy areas. They’ll meet four times and will submit a report to the Mayor around August or September. After that will come the drafting of the RFP. In between, there could be some focus-group effort or one workshop.
I hadn’t heard about this! Sounds great…think it will happen?
As a student of FIU, I’m very pleased and happy with their wireless network. Not only is it fast and responsive, but I am able to get online pretty much anywhere on campus (University Park)! This is great for me as I can check my mail or surf the net before class starts, after class, or if the teacher has given us a break (3 hr classes).
When I heard that Mayor Alvarez wants to bring wireless Internet access to Miami-Dade Residents, I was very excited! It not only shows that Mayor Alvarez is in touch with the technology side of our country, but that also we’d be one of the few counties in the U.S. that has wifi available. While they have said that the price of the wifi will be compareable to dialup, I hope they don’t go based on AOL’s dialup plans 😉
The one biggest area where I can’t wait to use this is in the public library. I often like to visit the West Kendall Regional Library and use my laptop to surf the net. This allows me to get ‘out of the house’ as well as go to a quiet place to study. Because FIU is on 8th ST and I’m 5 minutes from West Kendall Regional Library, I prefer to go to the library to study. But because they block almost all the websites, instant messenger and anything else, it kind of makes it difficult to do research. But if Miami-Dade’s wifi will work inside the library, I would be able to do more research online at the library than staying at home and doing it here. Btw, did you ever look up the information about the IP information of the public library? It belongs to Broward County Public Schools!