Chattanooga and Hamilton County earn two national recognitions in same week
The City of Chattanooga, Hamilton County and their partners have earned two national awards this week.
As noted in this late June article in teknovation.biz, Chattanooga was a finalist in the 2021 edition of the “IDC Smart Cities North America Awards” competition. The community was nominated for its project titled the “Pedestrian Analysis of the MLK Smart Corridor.”
Earlier this week, IDC announced that the partnership of the Center for Urban Informatics and Progress at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, the City of Chattanooga Smart City Division, Ouster, and Seoul Robotics were the winners in the category for which they were a finalist.
Then, a couple of days later, it was announced that the City and Hamilton County have together been named a “Digital Inclusion Trailblazer” by the National Digital Inclusion Alliance. The recognition was given to 16 communities across the country whose local governments promote digital literacy and broadband access.
The two governments are in the company of cities such as San Francisco, Seattle, New York, and Boston, and the recognition is based on six indicators that reflect each government’s commitment to digital equity. Chattanooga and Hamilton County, as one honoree, were one of just three communities to receive checks in all six categories. It is also the second year in a row that Chattanooga and Hamilton County were named a Trailblazer.
Across the nation and beyond, the local governments are recognized for efforts ranging from the long-standing “Tech Goes Home” program, which teaches digital literacy and provides each graduate with a subsidized laptop, to the more recent HCS EdConnect program that was focused on access during COVID-19.
