In May Seattle City Light will launch its new Web pages in Spanish for Spanish-speaking customers. Visit seattle.gov/light and click "En Español" for information about opening and closing accounts, energy bill-assistance and discounts, energy conservation, electrical safety and more. Included is a list of community service organizations with links to sites-of-interest for the Latino community.

MeetingWizard is a free application that helps you arrange and schedule meetings and other events. You select some possible dates and who’s invited, along with their email addresses. It sends invitations with a link to participants; they use the link sent to go to your MeetingWizard page and check-off which times work. The site then summarizes the responses of invitees, updates the results, and sends confirmations and optional reminders.

The National Association of Secondary School Principals is inviting proposals from public middle level and high schools serving large numbers of low-income students and underrepresented minorities (greater than 40% of student body) to apply for a $5,000 mini-grant to implement a special initiative aimed at strengthening ties between their schools and their students' neighborhoods and communities. Principals are invited to submit a proposal that will build bridges between their school faculty and the surrounding community. For more information, go here.

New free WiFi spots become available to the public in May. City Hall's front plaza facing Fourth Avenue will open officially on May 14 and will soon offer free WiFi service both inside and outside the building. Mayor Nickels will be launching city WiFi in Columbia City on May 18th at 10 at the Wellington restaurant. Columbia City is being wired for WiFi in a partnership between the city, Columbia City Business Association and the Rainier Chamber of Commerce. On May 21, a partnership of the University of Washington, U District Chamber, and City of Seattle will inaugurate free WiFi on The Ave as part of the annual U District street fair. Four downtown parks (Occidental, Steinbrueck, Freeway and Westlake) will go live by the end of the month.

If you’re near the new City Hall, it’s worth a stop, and now you can bring your laptop too! The new plaza area outside City Hall has just opened and will soon offer free wireless access. Fire it up and tune into the Seattle Channel streamed live. And speaking of Internet streaming, there’s a real stream there, flowing through City Hall, down the steps and out through the plaza.

This month brings the opening of two new City of Seattle facilities offering public access to computers and the Internet. The Southwest Community at 2801 SW Thistle Street has opened a new computer lab as part of their $3 million remodel. The remodel includes a six station computer lab, new gym and teen center. More info here

Heading north, a brand new Ballard Neighborhood Service Center opens Saturday, May 14. The new service center at 5604 22nd Ave. N.W. adjoins a new library building as well. Both feature new public computers and great facilities. Go here for more info. The library has also posted a schedule of events.

There are a number of community computer centers that offer assistance to Spanish speakers. A few of these and their contacts include South Park Community Center, JD Leza, 8319 8th AV S, 684-7451; North Seattle Family Center, Maria Molina, 3200 NE 125th Suite#2, 364-7930; People of Color Against Aids Network-POCAAN, Maria Enriquez Lindsey, 2200 Rainier Avenue South Ave, 322-7061; High Point Career and Technology Center at High Point Elementary School, 6760 34th AV SW, 252-9480.

Acessa São Paulo is a community technology initiative by the State of São Paulo to close the digital divide. About 20 percent of the population has access to the Internet in Sao Paulo, but only three percent of the less affluent people have it. Acessa São Paulo has 200 InfoCenters spread across the city of São Paulo, the interior of the state, and the coast area. Their Community InfoCenters are open Monday to Saturday, eleven hours per day. Each center has two staff monitors, trained by the USP Escola do Futuro (School of the Future), 10 computers with Internet connections, printers, webcams and scanners. Any person over 11 years of age may use the computers.

They have developed PIM, Passaporte de Internet e Multimídia (Internet and Multimedia Passport), featuring support for user net-learning. After passing a test on basic email skills, Internet navigation, and text editing, participants receive a physical passport, similar to a conventional passport, to track learning with passport stamps. Their online MiniCursos include: How to Make a Resumé; How to Tie a Tie; Dengue; Personal Security; Sugar-less Sweets; and Internet Etiquette. For more information, see a description on Global Junior Challenge, or contact Dani Matielo. (Drawn from Digital Divide Network email discussion group. See the discussion group, or their website.

The Community Technology Program welcomes two additions to our universe. Congratulations to Delia Burke, Technology Matching Fund manager, who’s added Liam to her family. See a little web design and cute pics. We’re very pleased to have Shireen Deboo filling in while Delia is on maternity leave. Shireen is helping with this year’s matching fund grantees and some research and technical assistance. Shireen is a librarian who used to work with the Neighborhood Matching Fund. She brings a great combination of community work, project and contract management and information literacy skills to the program. Shireen can be reached at 233-2751. Look for more on the 2005 TMF awards in next month's Brainstorm.

You have a right to stop telemarketers from calling you on both your land line and cell phone. Cell phone numbers are expected to be released to telemarketing companies soon. As a result, you might start receiving sales calls and you'll be charged for these calls. You can call this number from your cell phone (888) 382-1222, to access the national DO NOT CALL list. It blocks your number for five years. You can also register up to three phones on their website, donotcall.gov.

A new consumer website, www.tips4you.org, provides Washington state consumers with valuable information about how to establish and protect their credit, avoid predatory lending, and effectively manage their money.

The site was developed by the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) and the national non-profit One Economy Corporation, and is funded by a two-year grant from the Washington State Office of the Attorney General. Several groups worked with LIHI and One Economy to develop content for the site, including CENTS, the Washington State Access to Justice Board, Seattle-King County Coalition for Responsible Lending (SKCCRL), and the Urban League of Metropolitan Seattle.

(From the CTCNet.org policy newsletter) In mid-April, the federal Office of Management and Budget released the second of two reports, mandated under the federal E-Government Act of 2002, addressing the role of community technology centers (CTCs) in meeting the needs of citizens through access to electronic government information and services.

The federal E-Government Act requires federal agencies to take specific actions to promote both access to, and delivery of, electronic government information and services in order to better meet the needs of people, improve agency performance, and increase opportunities for civic participation.

Two sections of the Act specifically reference CTCs. Section 213 requires the federal e-government administrator to provide an evaluation of the best practices of community technology centers, and to develop an online tutorial that explains how to access government information and services on the Internet. Section 215 requires a study of how disparities in Internet access influence the effectiveness of online government services, and how technology trends and increases in the availability of online government services impact disparities in Internet access.

The new report describes some promising practices of CTCs, but also acknowledges the dearth of federal funding and resources specifically available for CTCs at present.

Section 213 Report (PDF Format)
Section 215 Report (Word Format, ZIP file)

HUD Grants

Deadline: June 03
HUD is soliciting for public housing neighborhood network centers for both new and for upgrading labs.