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Information Technology for Community Action Agencies and Their Low-Income Clients Executive Summary Summer 2000 Introduction Over their thirty-five year history, community action agencies have made a real difference in their communities through innovative approaches to eliminating poverty. In great measure this is due to their ability to recognize the causes of poverty and to address them with well-designed and well-administered programs. The digital divide presents a new and significant challenge to the community action network. At the same time, for community action agencies, advances in Information Technology (IT) can serve as a vehicle for improved communications, collaboration, organizing and advocacy. Information Technology (IT) and the Digital Divide In recent years, the IT revolution has been the engine driving the nation's productivity and economic growth. The nation has moved from an "old economy" based on goods and services to a "new economy" based on ideas and information. There is a danger that, for persons with limited or no access to IT, the new economy will both perpetuate the "old (that is, existing) poverty" and also produce a "new poverty." Low-income people could remain on the wrong side of what has been dubbed the "digital divide." According to a recent U.S. Department of Commerce report, urban households earning incomes over $75,000 are over twenty times more likely to have home Internet access than rural households at the lowest income levels. At the federal level, there have been some noteworthy efforts aimed at closing the digital divide. The Clinton Administration included a package of IT initiatives in its proposed fiscal year 2001 federal budget. Among these are tax credits for private sector computer donations, sponsorship of community technology centers, a public-private partnership to expand computer availability in low-income homes and increased access to IT in underserved communities. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration within the U.S. Department of Commerce, has promoted the development, availability and use of IT under its Technology Opportunities Program. The U.S. Department of Education provides funding for neighborhood access through its Community Technology Centers initiative. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development runs the Neighborhood Networks program, providing training and technology access to residents of government-subsidized housing. The federal E-rate program has provided over $3 billion to help lower the costs of connecting schools and libraries around the country to the Internet. The Office of Community Services (OCS) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which administers the Community Services Block Grant program, has provided funding of model programs addressing computer technology issues. OCS has established a Monitoring and Assessment Task Force to address the issue of moving the community services network in a more results-oriented direction, including the management of multiple databases. Elsewhere, the governors of Minnesota, Maine and Virginia have put forth plans to address the digital divide in their states. The mayor of Atlanta has announced a community technology center initiative. Technology and telecommunications leaders in the private sector like AT&T, America Online, Compaq, SBC Communications, Microsoft, Gateway, IBM and others have made investments to help close the digital divide. A number of foundations are supporting initiatives to make IT more available to low-income and other groups. In spite of such initiatives, the total amount of funding available for closing the digital divide is quite small. The existing resources are wholly inadequate for the size and scope of the problem. The Role of Community Action Agencies Community action agencies are no strangers to the provision of IT training and access to their low-income clientele. The following are a few selected examples of projects currently in operation.
A National Survey of CAAs At its meeting in San Diego, California, December 3-4, 1999, the Community Action Partnership Board of Directors authorized a project called the Information Technology Support Initiative (ITSI). Its purpose is to support community action agencies in their efforts to upgrade their internal IT capabilities and to equip their low-income clients with computer skills and IT access. As part of this initiative, the Partnership mailed a CAA Information Technology Survey to 980 community action agencies. As of April 4, 2000, 169 community action agencies had returned completed surveys, for a 17.2 percent response rate. The survey respondents represented 45 states, including all ten of the Partnership's geographic regions. The data were analyzed using SPSS 10.0 for Windows. In terms of funding, three-quarters of the respondents were in the $500 thousand and under range. Single-county rural community action agencies made up one-fifth (22.3 percent) of the total respondents, multi-county rural community action agencies almost exactly half (49.3 percent) and urban/metro community action agencies 28.4 percent. On average, the number of staff persons per responding community action agency was 118. In over three-fifths of all community action agencies at least half the staff members use a PC on a regular basis. Overall, half of all community action agencies have sites linked by a computer network and 45 percent have Internet websites. Within community action agencies, word processing applications are universal and spreadsheet applications are virtually so. Also in widespread use are database and payroll/fiscal management applications. Many community action agencies use a graphics program like PowerPoint. Among other products mentioned by respondents were American Fundware, ChildPlus, Corel Draw, Filemaker Pro, GMS, Groupwise, Microsoft Publisher, Multiple Management Information System, Oracle Client-Tracking and PageMaker. Over a third of all community action agencies have no staff person devoted to IT, over a third have a half-time or a full-time equivalent (FTE) person, and somewhat less than a third have two or more FTEs. Many community action agencies operate with limited budgets and lack the discretionary dollars to devote to IT. Indeed, many operate quite successfully in the absence of an IT staff capacity. In response to a question on whether the agency had an ongoing internal IT committee, 62.3 percent said no, and nothing was planned; 14.9 percent said no, but one was planned, suggesting that this had become a priority. Among the respondents, 22.1 percent said yes, they had an ongoing IT committee. Of the respondents who said yes, two out of every five indicated that they had established such a committee within the past twelve months. This indicates that IT has become a major concern among a growing number of community action agencies. Half of the community action agencies responding to the survey assessed their current IT resources as adequate or more than adequate. This of course means that the other half does not see them as adequate. Whether or not a community action agency's current resources are adequate, large numbers of respondents appear to agree that maintaining or upgrading the agency's existing capacity will require additional resources. Internally, about half of the respondents assess the IT skills of their staff as adequate or more than adequate. Only about a third of all community action agencies employ the same standardized software applications across all programs and funding sources in order to create agency-wide tracking reports with unduplicated client counts. Community action agencies place a high degree of importance on standard demographic categories and service definitions. Over 70 percent regard this as important or critically important, with the figure nearing 80 percent for urban/metro community action agencies. Overall, 16.9 percent began offering training to low-income clients more than 12 months ago. An additional 11.7 percent began offering training in the past twelve months. Thus, 28.6 percent of all community action agencies are currently offering IT training. Another 24.0 percent have plans to offer IT training. If this occurs, the total number of CAAs which offer training would exceed 50 percent. A quarter (25.8 percent) began offering IT access - as distinct from training - over a year prior to completing the survey and an additional 16.8 percent began offering it within the twelve months prior to completing the survey. This indicates the rising importance of IT in community action agency efforts to assist low-income people. The survey provided respondents with a list of eight possible steps for developing their community action agency's IT capacity. Regular Staff Training was rated by the highest percentage of respondents as the most important step and hence was ranked number one. Next came Computer Equipment Upgrades, followed by Standardized Client Data Categories and Standardized Software Applications. Survey respondents were asked to indicate the most important action steps that federal, state and other funding sources could take to help improve community action agency IT systems and community-based IT programs. Two items were in a virtual dead heat for number one in the rankings overall. These were Agree on Standard Demographic Categories and Service Definitions (37.7 percent) and Provide Funding for Hardware and Software Upgrades (37.0 percent). Nearly 50.0 percent of single-county rural community action agencies rated standard data categories as most important. Almost exactly 40.0 percent of all rural community action agencies (single-county or multi-county) rated hardware and software funding as most important. Thus, both monetary and non-monetary actions would help CAAs in their efforts to close the digital divide. Community action agencies regard the standardization of demographic categories and service definitions as vitally important. However, the commitment of staff time and other resources to the issue is considered justified only if there is a reasonable expectation of a gain. The items receiving the smallest percentages were Provide Funding for Community Technology Centers in Low-Income Areas and Provide Funding for IT Training and Technical Assistance for Low-Income Clients. It is possible that community action agencies regard upgrading their internal IT systems as a necessary prerequisite to such community-based programs. Second, one can speculate that in some communities, training and access may already be available through other community-based resources, such as schools and libraries. For some agencies, upgrading the IT skills of low-income people may not have as high a priority as direct service programs like Head Start, housing assistance, weatherization and health care. Finally, there may exist a cautious attitude in some community action agencies toward new, untested ways of administering programs and providing services. It is often easier to justify an investment in the traditional direct services than in periodically upgrading the IT system. These possible explanations are speculative and would require additional research to confirm or disprove. Whatever the explanation, clearly it is not because community action agencies think the issue is unimportant. We have seen that a number have instituted IT-related projects for their clients. Many community action agencies provide IT-related training and/or access. A high proportion of these initiatives began within the twelve-month period prior to this survey. The issue is growing in importance. Closing the digital divide will not by itself eliminate poverty. However, it will put low-income people on a more equal footing with other groups. It will enable them to become better connected in a society where IT is playing an ever-larger role in people's personal lives and work places. Failure to close the divide will tend to split society further into the haves and have-nots. The digital divide is a national problem. The problem takes different forms from one region to another, one state to another and one community to another. Ultimately, it can only be solved one community and one client at a time. The community-based character and, at the same time, the national scope of the community action network make it uniquely suited to the challenge. The Community Action Partnership is dedicated to continuing its work with CAAs, state community action program associations and other partners in finding solutions to this pressing and ongoing issue. |
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