Nonprofit CEO lays out potential digital inclusion strategy for Topeka, calls on Joint Economic Development Organization to act

For more than a decade, Topekan Lazone Grays has worked to bridge digital divides.

He has worked with a nonprofit in Kansas City, Kan., to get a neighborhood WiFi project started in a housing development there. He works one-on-one with Topeka youth through his own nonprofit IBSA, Inc. to enhance their knowledge of technology. And recently, he has lobbied Topeka and Shawnee County’s Joint Economic Development Organization to take several steps to increase digital literacy, and ultimately prosperity, in the community.

The coronavirus pandemic and subsequent disruption of life as we know it, Grays said, “really woke everybody up” to an issue he has tried to address for years.

“It has been well known to me that in digital inclusion, equity,” Grays said, “the three-legged stool is internet access, computer devices and digital literacy.”

Topeka and Shawnee County are fairly well connected when it comes to internet access, he said. And acquiring computer devices is possible through partnerships with private organizations and companies willing to donate unused equipment. Therefore, according to Grays, digital literacy is what JEDO needs to address.

“Just because people have computers at the home doesn’t mean that they know how to functionally use them to empower themselves,” Grays said. “Digital literacy to us is teaching them how to use a computer in ways that they did not know, that is going to be beneficial to them throughout the remainder of their life, after they graduate from high school.”

He continues to call on the JEDO board, which focuses on local economic development, to do three things: come up with an actionable plan to address digital equity in the city and county, create a committee of community members to oversee implementation of a plan, and establish a digital inclusion fund to advance the plan and provide grants to organizations for their efforts to enhance digital inclusion.

“I look at JEDO because they are funded with public funds,” Grays said. “There is already a philosophy, and policy, to do things to help the socially and economically disadvantaged.”

He said an actionable plan needs to come first so that JEDO board members have a firm grasp of where they should direct funds.

“What are going to be the deliverables?” Grays said.

He notes that a local digital equity plan doesn’t have to be created from scratch, as there are other municipalities working toward the same goal. And their plans could serve as models for how to craft an initiative that would work for Topeka.

According to Angela Siefer, executive director of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance, that organization has identified about 15 “digital inclusion trailblazers,” which are cities and counties that were working to implement digital inclusion plans prior to the pandemic.

Kansas City, Mo., is one of those trailblazers. That city’s plan, and others, are published on the NDIA website.

“Let’s take (a few) of them, scratch out whatever and make one that is good for Topeka, Shawnee County,” Grays said. “There’s something universal in all of those.”

His second request of JEDO — the creation of a committee to oversee implementation of a plan — could bring together people in the area who are passionate about digital inclusion and want to see a plan succeed.

“There are other people like me who are very passionate about this,” Grays said. “We could be working, sort of like the Momentum 2022 committees, on different things.”

Lastly, creation of a digital inclusion fund would allow JEDO to invest in initiatives that move the potential plan forward. Grays envisions JEDO directing a certain amount into the fund on the front end and encouraging local private entities to contribute to that fund over time so that it remains active and can be used to constantly enhance the community’s digital equity efforts.

Grays imagines local organizations applying for grants through the fund when tackling digital inclusion projects, and the newly formed committee would review those grant applications.

According to Grays, funds could potentially be used to place equipment in community centers in east Topeka, to start educational programs that would help children and their families learn how to use different technologies, or to bring courses that teach marketable skills like coding or videography to young people in underserved areas of the capital city.

“A lot of what I’m trying to do is to break the cycle, not to give up on the adults, but we do have to break the cycle,” Grays said, “because in many cities we’re dealing with third and fourth generation welfare, poverty.”

According to Siefer, of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance, Grays’ recommendations are reasonable first steps toward addressing digital equity in a community. In fact, she said, his recommendations are three of the six indicators the NDIA uses to determine its “digital inclusion trailblazers.”

Digital inclusion, equity and literacy, Siefer said, are more important now than ever before, as even fields that haven’t traditionally relied on digital technology have moved in that direction.

“You have to have all of those things to participate in any way in today’s society,” Siefer said. “Even the jobs that we used to think of as not being technical now require us to have at least some understanding of technology. Construction jobs use tablets. ... Health care — currently we are able to use telehealth, but you can only participate in telehealth if you have a device, you have internet connection and you understand how to use the application. Education is the obvious one for everybody right now.”

And Grays pointed out that most job applications nowadays are available online, so people in low-income areas may be at a disadvantage when job hunting if they don’t have access to a digital device or don’t know how to properly use it.

Like Siefer, Grays argues creating a culture of digital inclusion has long-term economic benefits and ties into Topeka and Shawnee County’s recent efforts to develop its workforce and retain talent.

It is also crucial, he said, to closing gaps in access to opportunity.

“We’re going to have to deal with this digital divide issue,” Grays said. “I want us to be better than Wichita and Douglas (County) and Riley County and any other place. The capital city should lead by example. ...

“Economic disparities, economic empowerment — that’s the lane that I’m trying to stay in,” he added. “Advocacy and getting the job done is something that when you commit to doing it, you have to follow it through until the end.”