Digital Justice

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Digital Divide
Community Leads
Surveillance Policy
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The pandemic heightened technology’s impacts on frontline communities by increasing reliance on digital connections.

Suma worked with frontline partners and governments to address the digital divide as a formal part of pandemic responses, including City of Portland efforts that delivered thousands of tech kits (devices + internet access cards) to community members via trusted frontline partners and State of Oregon efforts to increase broadband access.

Click on the photo to see findings from a late 2021 survey of frontline partners about ongoing digital divide needs in their communities.

Suma and partners successfully advocated for the City of Portland to support a new program, “Community Leads,” within Smart City PDX in the City’s Bureau of Planning & Sustainability.

Building off a 2019-20 pilot, the Community Leads program pays community members as independent contractors to help create intentional and collaborative decision-making space for communities to work with the City of Portland on data and technology related decisions and to support digital justice.



Suma is working with frontline partners and the City of Portland to develop the City’s first surveillance policy.

Building off community-City collaboration that passed Portland's 2020 ban on the private use of facial recognition technology, surveillance policy development is another step away from a patchwork of tech policymaking, activities and staff spread across multiple City bureaus and toward an inclusive, transparent and robust technology policymaking structure for the City of Portland.

Click on the photo to learn more about the surveillance policy process.

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