Rural Georgia Initiatives Presents: Rural Broadband - Resources for Your Community Deployment
Join Rural Georgia Initiatives for its third informative webinar on rural broadband in Georgia featuring: Deana Perry, executive director of broadband, Georgia Department of Community Affairs; Eric McRae, associate director, Information Technology Outreach Services, University of Georgia Carl Vinson Institute of Government; and Bill Price, senior strategy analyst, Georgia Technology Authority.
What You’ll Learn:
- The fundamental steps of obtaining broadband for your community
- The diverse broadband technologies and applications in different environments
- Availability of data and ways to use it to understand the needed financial investment for broadband
- The various funding options for broadband deployment
- What resources are available to support communities
Live Q&A to follow
Speakers:
Deana Perry - Executive Director of Broadband, Georgia Department of Community Affairs
Deana Perry has served as the Executive Director of the Rural Broadband Program at the Department of Community Affairs since its inception in 2018. The mission of this program is to provide planning, deployment, and incentives for broadband services and other emerging communications technologies throughout the state.
Perry came to DCA from the Northwest Georgia Regional Commission, where she spent more than three years working with communities to develop broadband strategy. In this role, she promoted the need to identify broadband assets, drafted policy revisions and identified funding opportunities.
Prior to her work at Northwest Georgia Regional Commission, Perry served as an advisor to Parker FiberNet/Appalachian Valley Fiber Network on compliance and building alliances for public private partnerships. From 2010-14, she was the Program Manager with AVFN for a $26 million broadband stimulus grant funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Previously, Perry was Controller for Parker Systems where she directed all financial management functions and provided financial guidance to pursue the company’s growth strategy. She worked with PFN/AVFN and its affiliates for more than 15 years.
Perry holds a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing from Georgia Southern University. Perry and her husband Tim, an attorney in Chattooga County, have one son and reside in Trion.
Eric McRae - Associate Director of Information Technology Outreach Services, University of Georgia Carl Vinson Institute of Government
Eric McRae is responsible for the Institute of Government’s Office of Information Technology Outreach Services (ITOS), which helps state and local governments incorporate into their operations a wide array of geographic information systems (GIS) technology, including parcel mapping, digitizing paper maps, and integrating transportation/addressing systems. ITOS also provides practical training in the latest mapping technologies. He has managed multiple local, state, national, and international GIS projects and initiatives and has served on and chaired numerous GIS and information technology boards and committees, including the National States Geographic Information Council.
Bill Price - Senior Strategy Analyst, Georgia Technology Authority
Bill Price is a senior strategy analyst at the Georgia Technology Authority. He is currently focused on implementing broadband legislation, the Achieving Connectivity Act, for the State of Georgia which was passed in 2018.
While at GTA, Bill developed and managed the Digital Georgia Program for the state to: invest, develop and manage projects that increased the use of technology across business and government: Digital Economy Plans, Digital Bootcamps, E-rate Support Program, Telemedicine, Broadband Mapping, Makerspaces and an Educational technology grant program.
Bill has over 30 years in telecommunications and technology services development and operations. His telecommunications track record of delivering results spans wireless, wireline, internet services and applications. At BellSouth, Bill led the development, launch and operations of BellSouth’s Internet Division in 1995. Bill successfully launched and managed the first Metropolitan Area Network in the U.S. while at Centel and Sprint in Tallahassee, Florida. Bill led Sprint’s Advanced Network Service group to develop innovative communication services for business and government.
The Rural Georgia Initiatives Team
Rural Georgia Initiatives’ mission is to help rural Georgia communities become more competitive for economic development projects and identify new strategies for attracting jobs and investment. The division serves as an extended resource from the Georgia Department of Economic Development to all communities and coordinates efforts between the many statewide entities and agencies through collaboration and communication. Traveling across rural Georgia, the team collects best practices and success stories amongst communities. This division works diligently to advance these strategies, thereby improving the quality of life for those residing in Georgia’s rural communities.