Chapter XV
Hervey Bay in Transition: The Role of Community-Based Information Technology
in Overcoming the
Great Digital Divide
Wayne Pease, University of Southern Queensland, Australia
Lauretta Wright, University of Southern Queensland, Australia
Malcolm Cooper, University of Southern Queensland, Australia
ABSTRACT
In regional Australia there is a growing interest and investment in community capacity building and this is beginning to be formalised in a desire to integrate information communications technology opportunities with other forms of community development. This paper explores the opportunity for greater social integration based on the formation of community-based information communication technology (ICT) driven organizations, using a case study approach. It is suggested that whether disseminating information, collaborating with other communities, assisting the development of new industries, or simply by sharing the lessons learned along the way, community-based IT can assist and support a community’s economic and
social development. Further, the paper supports the view that, where understanding and developing new forms of information technology through community informatics is accepted as an integral part of such development, communities will not just ‘improve the old’ but will more radically restructure themselves towards a knowledge-based future.
The case study that underpins these observations is that of the development of Bay Connect, a community-based Internet development and training project, begun in Hervey Bay with Networking the Nation support, and which is now expanding into the adjacent Maryborough and surrounding Shires. It is also supported by the University of Southern Queensland’s Wide Bay and has an emergent role in supporting new and existing IT businesses, Bay Connect and the Hervey Bay City Council, in the creation and nurturing of an IT skills base within the region.
INTRODUCTION
The Wide Bay region of Queensland, Australia, is, on nearly every indicator, an economically and socially disadvantaged region (Planning Information and Forecasting Unit, 2001). In regional Australia there is a growing interest and investment in community capacity building to ameliorate this type of disadvan-tage. Community capacity building is designed to assist groups and individuals within an area to provide greater opportunities for social and economic partici-pation by building their social capital (through stronger networks, trust and shared values). If this can be achieved, communities can offer individuals more opportunities for economic and social participation. A key part of community capacity building is connecting individuals in ways that enable people to support each other or to access greater levels of information. One of the ways that this has been achieved in the context of Hervey Bay is through the integration of information communications technology opportunities with other forms of com-munity development.
This chapter explores the opportunity for greater levels of such integration based on the formation of community-based information technology driven organizations. It is suggested that whether disseminating information, collaborat-ing with other communities, assisting the development of new industries, or simply by sharing the lessons learned along the way, community-based ICT can assist and support a community’s economic and social development. Further, the paper supports the view that, where understanding and developing new forms of information technology through community informatics is accepted as an integral part of such development, communities will not just ‘improve the old’ but will more radically restructure themselves towards a knowledge-based future.
The development of Bay Connect, a community-based Internet develop-ment and training project begun in Hervey Bay with Australian Commonwealth
Government funding provided by the Networking the Nation (NTN) program, is one such example. Its development and expansion into Maryborough and surrounding shires is used as a case study in this chapter. The University of Southern Queensland’s role in the creation, nurturing and expansion of an ICT skills base within the region through its Wide Bay is also discussed.
BACKGROUND
Australian Internet Activity Statistics
Australia has consistently demonstrated a high level of adoption and use of technologies such as the Internet, with significant levels of economic and social activity now occurring online. The National Office for the Information Economy (NOIE) ranked Australia third overall behind the United States of America and Sweden in a benchmarking index which ranked fourteen key countries across 23 statistical indicators relating to progress in developing the information economy (National Office for the Information Economy, 2002). In this study the United States of America, Scandinavia, Australia, New Zealand and the smaller countries of South East and East Asia are considered to be in a strong position to take advantage of the potential benefits of the emerging global information economy, having the beginnings of the necessary infrastructure and a critical mass of people actively online. It was, however, noted that for the majority of countries benchmarked, there is still significant room for improvement, with large sections of their respective populations remaining outside the information economy, either having access to the Internet and not using this resource, or not having the opportunity to use the Internet due to lack of access opportunities.
The data presented in the NOIE report shows that Australians are major adopters of information economy enabling technologies such as the Internet, computers, and mobile telephones, and increasingly use the Internet for a wide range of activities associated with their day-to-day lives. Some of the findings presented in the report include:
?52% of Australian households connect to the Internet (ranked seventh in the world);
?Approximately 5% of Australians using the Internet at home were esti-mated to have accessed the Internet from home at high speeds (DSL, Cable, LAN, etc.) (ranked ninth);
?54% of persons gained Internet access via a home PC (ranked eighth);?72% of persons 16 years and over could access the Internet from any location (ranked fifth);
?80% of Australians aged 16 to 34 years of age were estimated to have access to the Internet compared to 68% of Australians aged 35 years and over (ranked first);
?
73% of males and 72% of females aged 16 years and over in Australia had access to the Internet (ranked first);?Australia had created an environment conducive to the emergence and
development of e-business opportunities (ranked second).
Table 1 shows the extent of Internet activity conducted through the Internet Service Provider (ISP) industry in Queensland, by regions. It contains results from all identified ISPs operating in Queensland in respect of the three months ended September 2001 (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2002). Comparison of the estimated number of subscribers with the estimated statistical division populations for Queensland (see Figure 1) shows a distinct disparity for the Wide Bay — Burnett statistical division. With approximately 6.6% of the estimated state population, this division has only 3.2% of Internet subscribers. While it is true that all regions apart from Fitzroy (based on the City of Rockhampton)outside of the Brisbane metropolitan area exhibit somewhat similar patterns,Wide Bay Burnett is particularly under-subscribed on a per head basis with respect to the Internet. As a measure of the twin benchmarks of a developed economy of connectedness with the outside world and information richness, this is a particular problem for the Wide Bay region.
Table 1. Selected Internet Activity by Statistical Division, Queensland for the Three Months Ended — September 2001
Statistical Division ISPs POPs Access Lines Queensland Internet Subscribers ('000) Percentage
of Total
Queensland
Internet
Subscribers
Average Number of Subscribers per Access Lines Average MB Data Downloaded per Subscriber Estimated Total Population June 2001 Percentage of Estimated Queensland Population Brisbane 98 119 48454 460 56.1
9.5 276 1656731 45.7 Moreton 57 82 16147 152 18.5
9.4 192 713525 19.7 Wide Bay - Burnett 16 30 4116 26 3.2
6.3 149 237753 6.6 Darling Downs 22 41 4392 35 4.3
7.9 186 203564 5.6 South West 4 17 248 na na
na 36 25567 0.7 Fitzroy 16 32 6710 45 5.5
6.7 215 182349 5.0 Central West 3 5 na na na
11.7 50 12034 0.3 Mackay 17 23 2495 23 2.8
9.2 186 142063 3.9 Northern 11 15 3143 30 3.7
9.4 137 190170 5.2 Far North 19 32 4302 43 5.2
10.1 192 228154 6.3 North West 5 12 na 4
0.5 na na 35906 1.0
Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2002
Hervey Bay and the Wide Bay Region — A Snapshot
Connectedness with the outside world, the availability of information, and the ability to use it is heavily influenced by the high population growth rate of the Wide Bay-Burnett region. With an average annual growth rate of over 2% for Hervey Bay (representing 36% of total regional growth) and approximately
1.3% for the region as a whole (KPMG, 2000), the region as a whole is expected to grow from 236,700 in 2000 to 284,000 by 2016. Within this pattern, the case study cities of Maryborough-Hervey Bay and their surrounding Shires had a combined population in 2000 of 76,200, and this is expected to grow to 100,000by 2016 (Planning Information and Forecasting Unit, 2001). This on-going high growth rate will take Hervey Bay from 19th place in Queensland population ranking (as at 1996) to 16th in 2016 (above Rockhampton at 17th and Bundaberg at 20th ), but also hides an influx of the traditionally less well-connected low-income earners and the aged.
This very high growth rate has thus paradoxically resulted in the Wide Bay Region having the second highest welfare recipient rate in Australia, with a ratio of Department of Social Security (welfare) payments to personal disposable income of 27.9% (Bray & Mudd, 1998). Part of this is because unemployment Figure 1. Comparison of Internet Subscribers Compared with Overall Estimated Statistical Division Populations
0.0%10.0%20.0%30.0%40.0%50.0%60.0%
Brisba ne Moreton W ide Ba y - Burn D arling D own South W C entral W No rthe rn Fa r N orth N orth W S t a t i s t i c a l D i v i s i o n
Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2002
levels are high in the region — being around 16% in Hervey Bay itself. The latter situation is particularly difficult for Indigenous peoples, with only 39% in Hervey Bay being employed compared with a state employment level for Indigenous people of 59% (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1998), and youth, whose unemployment is around 23% across the region. As a result, income levels in the region are low compared to state and national benchmarks. For example, Hervey Bay’s median household income level in 1999 was 25% below the Australian median, at 68 out of 70 of the cities surveyed (KPMG, 2000), while median personal income was one-third that recorded for Brisbane, at 427 out of 447localities in Queensland.
This in turn means that, while as a consequence of recent immigration patterns the school-aged proportion of the population of the region is actually slightly higher than the national average (Department of Education, Science and Training, 2001) and new groups of professionals are now entering the population,the historic take-up of IT access opportunities has been limited by socio-economic factors in the Wide Bay Burnett region. This significant level of socio-economic disadvantage at least partly explains the low rate of take-up of Internet communication opportunities, but also means that there is opportunity for change if community capacity building in the IT area can be achieved in some other way.It is to the socio-economic growth opportunities inherent in IT that we now turn.Table 2. Demographics of the Wide Bay Population
?
Dependency ratio is the number of dependent age persons (0-14/65+) compared with those of working age. Sex ratio is the number of males to females.
* Note that Hervey Bay median age and dependency ratio is predicted to fall — meaning more youth and working age people coming in/staying as the economy and education opportunities expand.This refutes the commonly held belief that Hervey Bay represents a retirement village — it is actually an emerging regional economy.
? Note that the data for the State as a whole refers to 2036, whereas that for the individual cities and Shires refers to 2016, so the projections are not directly comparable.Regional
Area Median Age Sex Ratio? Dependency Ratio ?
1996 2016 1996 2016
1996 2016 Queensland 34 42 100.4 99.5 49.7 59.4? Wide Bay
region
36 41 101.4 98.8 59.2 61.1 Hervey
Bay 38 41 98.0 89.9 63.1 55.5*
Bundaberg 36 39 95.5 94.4 61.2 61.7
COMMUNITY CAPACITY BUILDING THROUGH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY The growth in the use of online technologies for communication purposes is one of the most interesting phenomena of our time. Digital technology has created complex links between telecommunications and computing technologies, transforming the ways in which information is exchanged and accessed (Austra-lian Bureau of Statistics, 1999). One regional community in southeast Queensland, the City of Hervey Bay, has become increasingly aware of these rapid advances in information and telecommunications technology and of the ways in which personal computers and the Internet have begun to contribute to social and economic change in Australia. It has attempted to solve a community problem by establishing a public Internet access project — Bay Connect — to counter the existence of an ‘information poor’ section of the community (Langtry, 1998) in the and its surrounds.
Engaging the Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Technology is embedded within a socio-political system and each social structure has choices to make about how, or whether, a new technology will be used (Lyon, 1998, p. 133). There are social and political implications inherent in the introduction of every new technology. It is important then to consider the Networking the Nation program and the Bay Connect project in its socio-economic and political context.
Networking the Nation was conceived during a period of rural disenchant-ment and economic decline, with the considerable political hope that new forms of communication technology would help to minimize some of the disadvantages experienced by Australians living in rural and remote areas (Molnar, 1998), and be seen to do so. Langtry (1998, p. 8) commented on the political climate within which this Federal program emerged:
“All this is occurring at a time when government is increasingly
inclined to let ‘market forces’ have their head. There are big
policy issues here, some of which have been discussed publicly
only in the vaguest terms, and a great deal more needs to be
known about what is actually going on. Voiced concerns about
the development of a new ‘information poor’ will remain hollow
unless policy-makers and the public have access to better
information, and are prepared to recognize the full dimensions of
the ethical issues involved.”
Bay Connect
In 1994 Hervey Bay City Council (HBCC) hosted a Community Develop-ment Workshop to look at the socio-economic position of the people of Hervey
Bay. From this workshop, the Council produced a needs analysis in which they identified inadequate access to information and information networks as contrib-uting to social fragmentation and isolation in the Hervey Bay community. In 1995, the Council received funding under the Social Infrastructure Program from the Department of Families, Youth & Community Care to set up an interim steering committee to discuss this issue, prioritise needs and formally set up a structure to deal with those needs.
The committee became known as Community Solutions Hervey Bay Association Inc., and one of its first actions was to seek support for a local online database or Intranet to address the lack of access to relevant and up-to-date information for the residents of Hervey Bay. In April 1998, Community Solutions received a grant of $715,000 over four years from Networking the Nation, and the Bay Connect project was realised. This funding accounted for only 54% of the amount sought however, and required supplementation by the HBCC (which supported the establishment and maintenance of the Bay Connect Web site) and Community Solutions, which supported the telecommunications costs of the public Internet access sites in the first year, and continues to subsidise usage.
Within the City of Hervey Bay, Bay Connect is primarily concerned with building community awareness of available services, facilities and programs designed to enhance information exchange for the socially disadvantaged. It directly addresses the ‘Great Divide’ through training and Internet access points for all, but concentrating on the needs of the aged, pensioners, and the disadvantaged. The management structure for the project is relatively simple. Strategic management is the responsibility of a committee formed from commu-nity representatives, the Hervey Bay City Council and the Community Solutions group. Members of this committee are chosen on the basis of their various skills - technical, management and individual awareness of community needs. Opera-tional management is the responsibility of a project manager who reports directly to this committee.
Initially, Bay Connect was set up like a Freenet with free public access to maximise pensioner use; however, a user-pays system was introduced on February 21, 2000. Up until that point, the project had provided free training, plus free electronic mail (e-mail) and Internet access to holders of Health Care Cards and Pension Concession Cards who represent approximately 40% of the community. Six Internet access sites were set up at geographically significant points throughout the city (including educational institutions, government agen-cies and the library), with volunteers stationed at each to support site operations. After 2000 the charges outlined in Table 3 were made (plus $0.50 per half hour or part thereof for Internet access), in order to stretch out the initial funding and give the project an impetus towards permanency after grant funds are ex-hausted.
Bay Connect in Practice
Despite the demise of other Networking the Nation projects, Bay Connect has been able to establish partnerships for support and sponsorship, and thrive.Bay Connect management supported the Maryborough City Council and the Tiaro Shire with their successful funding applications in recent rounds. The Maryborough project has the access sites as locally self-sufficient and the training room as a joint venture with the Wide Bay Resource Centre of Queensland Education. The Resource Centre will be able to provide ongoing training to Bay Connect clients after the initial funding has been expended.
In the last round of NTN funding — March 2002 — the Gympie and Bundaberg Councils also sought Bay Connect’s guidance with their respective applications. The Maryborough, Tiaro, Gympie and Bundaberg areas have received funding to set up Internet access programs modelled after the Bay Connect operation in response to the goal to provide public telecommunication access in a range of regional locations. This mentorship is an indication of the success of the Bay Connect model (McKeehan, B., personal communication,February 28, 2002). Bay Connect itself also applied for and received funding in March 2002 in the NTN final funding round to set up an adaptive training room.In keeping with Hervey Bay City Council’s theme of Access , the Bay Connect training programs will continue to support a range of clientele with a variety of needs. With over 1,100 people having passed through Bay Connect’s training programs since their inception in 1999 they remain flexible, responding to varying Table 3. Bay Connect Charges Post February 2000Price per hour
Course Description Non-Bay
Connect
Member
Bay Connect Member Level 1 - ‘Computers don’t Byte’ – 8 hours tuition, first 4 hours free
$10
$5 Level 2 – ‘Computers and the Internet’ – 20 hours
$10
$5 Level 3 – ‘More than Bits and Bytes’ – 20 hours
$10
$5 Keyboarding Skills
$10 $5
conditions and priorities in the Hervey Bay community. The recent addition of a fourth on-going training course is the result of their ability to respond to community demand.
Bay Connect supports their community in their use of ICT and the Internet, and does so only with the co-operation of a range of partners. They expect to divest themselves of the access site responsibility (to each access site host) by the end of June 2003, which will decrease the technical support requirement of Bay Connect. The equipment, which requires replacement shortly, will hopefully be replaced by the site hosts via the Gambling Benefit Fund, or a similar source of community funding. The Manager reports that Bay Connect is funded to the end of June 2004 and they are currently working on securing further joint ventures to source funding, equipment and software. They are also attempting to raise awareness in the Hervey Bay community that will better enable it to gain from the benefits of modern technology (McKeehan, B., personal communica-tion, January 22, 2003).
In order to test the client effectiveness of the Bay Connect model, a survey was undertaken in 2000-2001 by one of the authors (Wright, 2001) that sought, inter alia, to understand Bay Connect clients and their relationship with the Internet medium. The results indicated that while there were operational issues with the enterprise, the new Internet users attracted by the Bay Connect project had experienced a change in their media use patterns. Exposure to the Internet affected the way they sought information and the ways in which they commu-nicated. The study showed that Bay Connect clients were (a) purchasing computers, and (b) seeking supplementary and alternative Internet access to that of Bay Connect.
A majority of surveyed individuals (more than 90%) indicated that they would use the Internet if it were available. This shows that Bay Connect has enhanced the awareness and utilization of this form of communication within its membership. This is not a phenomenon restricted to Hervey Bay: the Internet is changing millions of people’s lives by altering the way in which they obtain information. With its “mutability” the Internet is also changing rapidly — daily —introducing users to many new functions, faster speeds, more Web sites and information (Newhagen & Rafaeli, 1996). It is also quickly becoming a ‘place’where mediated communication forms occur as O’Regan (2000) posited, and this would suggest that the potential for use of the Internet as a community integration tool could exceed the variety provided by most other media (Wright, 2001). The evolution of mediated Internet communication has not led to extinction of conversation, lecture, letter writing, or storytelling; neither have the broadcast industries disappeared.
The long-term impact of this public Internet access program on its commu-nity is still being assessed, and this will be an ongoing process. With the up-take of broadband and a new Web page, the manager of the project is optimistic that
Bay Connect will continue to serve its community’s changing needs and also mentor further regional Internet access projects (White, T., personal communi-cation, February 28, 2002). A group of 60 active Bay Connect volunteers also foster this optimism. The volunteers drive the success in the take-up and utilisation of the Bay Connect services. As site supervisors they are stationed at the any of the six access sites to provide advice, assessment of user skills, and referrals to training, as well as handle the administration and log on procedures. Support at the Internet access sites is a critical issue. Site operation is conditional upon their presence. The Bay Connect volunteers are a dedicated contingent and the lifeblood of the project; they now ‘own’ the project. Their active involvement has lead to greater efficiencies and is paving the way to project sustainability. Hervey Bay’s Bay Connect has thus at least partially succeeded in developing a regional community that is aware and skilled in the use of advanced telecom-munications services, in line with the original objective.
The University of Southern Queensland and Partners The University of Southern Queensland’s Wide Bay has made a significant contribution to the overall development of the communication and information technology expertise of the local community in line with its role as a regional higher education provider. Information technology staff (both academic and support) have been involved extensively with community-based projects includ-ing Bay Connect, setting up the first Macromedia Users Group outside of the Capital Cities in Australia, fostering the emergent information technology industry within Hervey Bay, and were instrumental in setting up a branch of the Australian Computing Society in Hervey Bay. The University teaches and delivers in full day mode a range of information technology-based degree courses and provides specialised professional development courses for Hervey Bay’s business community.
On the basis of this increase in expertise and the University’s strengths in software engineering and business management, the Hervey Bay City Council has recently launched the Fraser Innovation Zone (adjacent to the CBD in Pialba and based on the University campus). Local IT is an emerging industry in the Region; the first FIZ meeting in June 2001 attracted 100 business people to the University to videoconference with the Gartner Group (a major international player in IT). Start-up firms are seeking assistance with software solutions, and a number of contracts have been or are being negotiated, which will form the basis of a significant IT Research and Development capability within the Innovation Zone and contribute to tertiary level economic activity in the region. Additionally, the University currently houses Bay Connect within this precinct.
Local high schools also participate in the University’s early start programs, introducing University courses to Year 11 and 12 students. Currently courses are offered to IT and LOTE students, with opportunities for expansion of seamless
education pathways being actively developed. These are critical in respect of the regional program of achieving higher tertiary participation rates, especially in the emerging information economy.
FURTHER DISCUSSION
Australia Bureau of Statistics data shows that the overall level of Australian digital inclusion is increasing (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2001). Evidence of the rise is the increase in the share of households with Internet access, which suggests that the digital divide may be starting to narrow, although this appears to be by no means uniform as evidenced by the following:
?As age increases, the likelihood that an adult is either a computer user or an Internet user decreases;
?Older adults are more likely to use a computer or access the Internet at home, younger adults at sites other than home or work and the remaining adults either at home or work;
?Employed adults are more likely to have used a computer or access the Internet than adults who are not employed;
?As income increases, the likelihood that an adult is either a computer user or an Internet user increases;
?Adults in metropolitan areas are more likely to have used a computer or to have accessed the Internet than adults in other areas.
These trends highlight the importance of public Internet access programs for the unemployed and older person living in a regional community in Australia like Hervey Bay. With the world’s economy now driven by information technol-ogy, the persistence of a divide of have and have-not Internet users could have serious social consequences in the not-too-distant future. However, such technologies need to service Australian communities rather than simply to service commercial interests. The issue of equity of access must be addressed. While the Internet already connects 100 million computers, this figure represents less than 2% of the world’s population (Amor, 2000), and it has become increasingly obvious that IT is designed for those who pay for its development: typically large commercial companies in developed countries. While under-standable, this means that if you are too poor to afford a telephone connection, you may become excluded from certain services like the Internet (Thomas, 1995).
Consumers need access to computers, modems and networks — not everyone has a telephone, some communicate an unwillingness to invest capital in the purchase of a computer, and many express a fear of technology. To complicate the issue of equitable Web access, not everyone knows about the Internet (Newman, 2000), or even if they do, not everyone takes advantage of
the full potential of media literacy. The challenge then for Australian communi-ties is to establish mechanisms like the Bay Connect project to increase awareness and provide local training in the use of such technologies.
It is clear that Internet-mediated communication is an increasingly impor-tant phenomenon in Australian society. It is unlike any media formerly used for either interpersonal or mass communication. The very form and function of the Internet provides a channel that facilitates a hybrid of traditional media to be used in very non-traditional ways. Most significantly, Internet access allows for many types of participation in the communication process. While the long-term impact of the Bay Connect Public Internet Access Program on its community is still being assessed, Bay Connect must continue to attract new customers in order to maintain a viable business front after the Networking the Nation grant is exhausted. It is important for Bay Connect at this juncture to identify further strategies for Web site development, training programs and Internet Access Sites, as well as to evaluate its progress. These strategies would then be integrated with the organization’s goal “to enhance the awareness and utilization of the Internet and online services by the community of Hervey Bay, particularly those residents who are economically and/or socially disadvantaged” in order to address its founding objective (Wright, 2001).
Inadequate access to information and information networks has been seen in the past as contributing to the fragmentation of the Hervey Bay community and the felt isolation of its residents. Bay Connect was established to challenge these community conditions and all available research has found that the community has begun responding to that challenge.
CONCLUSIONS
Internet access allows for many types of participation in communication processes. Through engagement in its processes, the empowerment potential of Internet use is great. As the 1994 Community Development Workshop in Hervey Bay pointed out, such opportunities could be especially important to the commu-nity members of Hervey Bay who are marginalized culturally and socially (the unemployed and other welfare recipients). Reducing marginalisation through the provision of public access information technologies such as the Internet by organizations like Bay Connect and the University of Southern Queensland has significant implications for community identity construction and maintenance. This is the real outcome and strength of the Bay Connect experience.
When considering the present and future of networked information and communication technology, however, it is certain that while the Internet seems to have many positive and democratising uses, there are also many obstacles that limit its potential. Thus, further research into the cultural, political, social and economic implications of Internet use by marginalized groups must be under-
taken to ascertain if the Internet’s potential is being realized. A second step would be to analyse what groups or interests are using which technologies for what purpose.
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