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How will this impact the day -today lives of Floridians? Rural areas have often struggled to gain access to the highest level of education, healthcare, retail, and other services. Broadband's potential to connect people and ideas at the speed of light offers new opportunities and abilities for Floridians. Other benefits include: • Economic Development — Broadband provides access to local, regional, state, national, and worldwide markets, enhancing opportunities for current businesses, while providing the infrastructure to create new businesses and technology-based companies in areas of our state that have traditionally lacked such business and employment opportunities. • Education —All levels of Florida's education system will benefit from the expansion of broadband infrastructure. High speed connectivity offers the promise of remote class instruction, shared course offerings, and a much greater range of media materials available online. Broadband can overcome geographical and financial barriers to provide a wide range of educational and cultural opportunities. • Healthcare — Telemedicine has the potential to revolutionize health care in rural America by allowing instant retrieval of health records, video interface, improved emergency response, and the possibility of `e -visits' that connect health professionals and specialists to patients in real time, at home, facilitating the highest quality of medical care to rural populations. The state of Florida recognizes the need for the expansion of broadband infrastructure to bridge the digital divide in communities throughout the state. Now, more than ever, it is crucial for Florida counties to develop effective and comprehensive strategic broadband initiatives at the local level that take advantage of federal, state, and other grant opportunities The most critical component of this comprehensive effort is coordination between Florida's Local Technology Planning Teams and the Department of Economic Opportunity's Office of Broadband. Section 288.9961, Florida Statutes, directs the Office of Broadband to build and facilitate Local Technology Planning Teams, which shall work with communities to: 1. Understand their current broadband availability; 2. Locate unserved and underserved businesses and residents; 3. Identify assets relevant to broadband deployment; 4. Build partnerships with broadband service providers; and 5. Identify opportunities to leverage assets and reduce barriers to the deployment of broadband Internet services in the community.