Canal WiFi Goes Live at Kerner Campus
The Canal WiFi network expanded to a new location this month after Marin County and MarinIT installed 3 Access Points on the roofs of the Health and Human Services Campus located at 3301 Kerner Boulevard, further expanding the coverage of the network throughout the neighborhood. These access point locations were designed to serve the adjacent parking lot area, reaching much of the Cardenas Market parking, the courtyard, and the area near the east end.
Upcoming expansion of the Canal WiFi project will focus on the new Homeward Bound building on Mill Street and Harbor Street. Vinh Pham, San Rafael Data & Infrastructure Manager is leading the coordination of this portion of the project with Rafat Raie, the City’s Traffic Engineer as part of the City Fiber Network Project.
Digital Marin – Draft Findings of Marin County Broadband Infrastructure
The Digital Marin project has been working with Magellan Advisors to find what network and broadband assets are in use or potentially available in Marin County to increase broadband access for everyone in Marin. This week Magellan released a draft memo and network asset inventory to stakeholders for review. The draft identifies only two easements of local, public-owned fiber networks including County–owned fiber within SMART easements and the City of San Rafael’s downtown fiber network for traffic signals. Additional institutional networks in the County include state managed CalNet infrastructure and the California Research and Education Network (CalREN), a state-owned 8,000 mile fiber backbone for libraries, schools, universities, and similar institutions, operated by the non-profit CENIC. The report also identifies the patchwork of private broadband providers throughout the County, cellular infrastructure, satellite infrastructure, and other “vertical assets” (buildings, poles, towers) that may be used to expand access to broadband countywide. Despite the variety of private and public players, access to broadband services are modest within the County, especially in rural areas.
The next step in the process will be for stakeholders to review and verify findings and provide a better understanding of countywide needs for connectivity, network infrastructure, and services. The final report will be available after stakeholder review and may be brought to Council.
Interactive Wildland Urban Interface Map
Measure C, passed in March 2020, supports coordinated wildfire prevention measures. This resource has created more opportunity for San Rafael’s Fire Department to tackle property inspections efficiently and effectively within the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI). WUI property inspections are crucial to helping people to come into compliance with regulations, in turn keeping everyone a little safer from the threat of wildfires.
The Fire Department is preparing an outreach effort to educate people about their responsibilities in mitigating wildfire risk. Digital was brought on board to assist in the outreach effort to assist in bulk mailing and the creation of an interactive, online map to help people easily find out if their property is within the WUI. This digital resource will be promoted through the mailing effort and help homeowners understand their role in managing vegetation on their property and assisting the community effort to reduce the risk of wildfire.
San Rafael Response to Worldwide Microsoft Exchange Attack
Earlier this month nearly 30,000 organizations in the United States were hacked via vulnerabilities in Microsoft Exchange servers (the software that manages email and calendars) in a high-profile attack by Hafnium, a Chinese hacking group. Our managed service provider, Xantrion, immediately acted when the vulnerability became evident, reviewed our network environment for vulnerabilities, and patched a server running the software. We were not at risk of this attack because our servers running the software are not available outside the City network. Scans of our network showed that there was no indication that our network was impacted.
Voices of the Community: CIVICMAKERS
Voices of the Community, hosted by George Koster, aims to create a supportive platform to bring “unheard voices and their stories from communities to create dialogues to address our common problems and support the change of the status quo.”
In Episode 92, Voices of the Community focuses on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the economic meltdown and how local governments are affected by this. Special guests include Judi Brown, cofounder of Civicmakers, Assistant Director of Human Resources at the City of San Jose, Kelli Parmely, and San Rafael previous Director of Digital Service and Open Government Rebecca Woodbury.