Santa Cruz County Moving Beyond Incumbent Inaction Community Broadband Bits 295
When community leaders in Santa Cruz County, California, decided to take steps to spur economic development, they knew they needed to improve local connectivity. For episode 295 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast, Policy Analyst Patrick Mulhearn from County Supervisor Zach Friend\u2019s office talks with Christopher this week about the steps they\u2019ve taken and their plans.Santa Cruz County is a blend of beach activity, relaxing natural destinations, and inland rural areas. Silicon Valley is nearby and people who work in the tech industry live in the city of Santa Cruz or the rural areas around it and commute to work. Unfortunately, national providers have not kept up with high quality connectivity throughout the county. As is often the case, the incumbent providers have concentrated their efforts on specific areas, leaving rural Santa Cruz County behind.\xa0Patrick and Christopher discuss how the county took steps to accommodate the big ISPs and what happened next. They also talk about how some people in rural areas have taken steps to solve their problems despite the lack of action by incumbents and what\xa0county officials have\xa0in mind for the future.Read the transcript for this show here.This show is 23 minutes long and can be played on this page or\xa0via iTunes\xa0or the tool of your choice\xa0using this feed.You can\xa0download this\xa0mp3 file directly from here. Listen to\xa0other episodes here\xa0or view all episodes\xa0in our index.Thanks to Arne Huseby for the music. The song is\xa0Warm Duck Shuffle\xa0and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.