Reservations to Get Computer Access
To speed computer access and improve telecommunications for American Indians, President Clinton will announce a plan today to provide basic telephone service for $1 a month on reservations, the White House said Sunday.
High-tech companies will join Clinton’s effort to spread the benefits of computers and the Internet, announcing pledges of money, training and equipment. The commitments will include $25 million from Qualcomm, $20 million in software from Novell and $15 million from Hewlett-Packard.
Gateway will offer technology literacy training for 75,000 teachers nationwide--including all teachers in East Palo Alto. The Waitt Family Foundation will promise 50,000 Gateway computers for technology centers helping underprivileged children, and America Online will offer 100,000 Internet accounts. The pledges will be announced today when Clinton speaks in East Palo Alto.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman William Kennard, scheduled to join the president to make the telephone service announcement in Shiprock, N.M., said he expects the plan to benefit 300,000 Indian households.
“It is disgraceful that we have a telephone system that is the envy of the world, but basic telecommunications services are not widely enjoyed by our land’s oldest people,” Kennard said in a statement.
To pay for the program, Kennard said, he will propose adding $17 million to an existing program that underwrites phone service for low-income people. That amounts to a 3.5% increase in funding for the program. Long-distance phone companies, which pay varied subsidies to states to assist low-income people, would ultimately pay the additional costs.
Poor American Indian households already qualify for a discount, but Clinton administration officials said the cost is still too high for many.
Meanwhile, Microsoft Corp. announced Sunday that it is donating more than $2.7 million in software and cash to help bridge the “digital divide” and economic disparity between Indian tribes and wealthier segments of society.
The company said the gift, all but $200,000 of it in software, will be divided among eight tribal colleges, including Dine College in Shiprock.
