This isn’t the only handbook and I don’t know that it’s the best but we can all use more help with the funding opportunities that are coming to the communities…

This Handbook offers key principles and best practices that state and local governments should follow in structuring their digital equity plans and establishing and supporting digital equity programs. States, territories, and Tribes are currently developing digital equity plans to meet the funding requirements of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). 1 County, municipal, and local governments also are developing more localized digital equity plans, recognizing the importance of home broadband connectivity and online services to social, civic, and economic participation, and leveraging funding provided under available federal and state programs.

This Handbook focuses on the importance of building “digital equity” into broadband availability and adoption programs. Digital equity requires acknowledging that different individuals and groups of individuals will require different skills, resources, and opportunities to successfully participate in an increasingly digital world, and empowering them to do so.

Broadband availability and adoption programs should be equitable by design, meaning programs should seek to address underlying social and economic inequalities and should focus, as appropriate, on groups, areas, and characteristics of greatest need: low-income groups; rural areas; communities with low rates of literacy and digital skills; aging individuals; persons with disabilities; and minority groups with low adoption rates.