MAADD Revolutionizes War on Poverty

CHICAGO, June 23, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Ministerial Alliance Against the Digital Divide (MAADD) launched an aggressive policy agenda today outlining how technology can provide solutions to many of the problems low income communities face, while providing opportunity to improve the lives of people living in poverty.

"Broadband is rapidly becoming a necessity of everyday life," said Reverend Roosevelt Watkins, National President of MAADD.  "In order to bring every man, woman and child in America into the Digital Age so that they can have access to safe communities, state-of-the-art healthcare, quality education and equal employment opportunities, we need to act quickly and take some necessary steps to move our nation from an analog world to an all-internet protocol world."

The paper outlines the historical struggles that have plagued low income and minority communities and highlights how broadband can help remove some of those barriers.

"Martin Luther King, Jr. stated that the next phase of the civil rights movement was for minorities to achieve economic equality," said Reverend Nazim B .Fakir, President of MAADD Minnesota and co-author of the policy paper.  "For decades many of these dreams have been postponed for people living in poverty because location and demographic barriers have stripped these communities from opportunity.  With broadband, many of these obstacles can be overcome since location can become a non-issue in the virtual world."   

"While there are many technological advances on the horizon in the areas of healthcare, education, public safety and economic development, there is a core need to develop the foundation that will become the platform for this technology to flourish," said Melia Carter, Executive Director of MAADD and co-author of the policy paper.  "This foundation requires that we transition our nation's infrastructure to an all-Internet Protocol broadband platform while expanding digital literacy, internet adoption and creating programs that train our people for the jobs of the future." 

A copy of the policy paper can be viewed at http://www.maadd.org/maadd-policy-perspective/.

The Ministerial Alliance Against the Digital Divide (MAADD) is a 220,000+ member, next-generation civil rights organization led by ministers devoted to bridging the Digital Divide and promoting economic and individual empowerment in low income and minority communities across the country.

SOURCE Ministerial Alliance Against the Digital Divide