Gregory Pranzo, Founder and CEO of PranzoTech Solutions, is calling for urgent, community-led action to close the digital divide—a problem he says is being overlooked by both the private and public sectors.
"We don't need another press release about broadband expansion plans," says Pranzo. "We need people on the ground showing others how to use the tools we already have. It's local, it's urgent, and it's everyone's job."
In a recent in-depth interview, Pranzo shared how his work in Baltimore has revealed the hidden costs of digital exclusion—from small business owners unable to access affordable automation tools, to families left out of city services due to a lack of basic digital literacy. "When a resident can't apply for a housing program because the form is online, that's not a tech failure—it's a systems failure," he said.
The data underscores the severity of the issue. According to the Baltimore Civic Tech Survey (2024), 35% of households in underserved Baltimore neighborhoods still lack reliable internet access. Nationally, Pew Research Center (2023) reports that 43% of adults in low-income U.S. households do not have home broadband. Additionally, the National Skills Coalition (2022) found that more than 30 million Americans lack basic digital skills—like creating a spreadsheet or sending a professional email.
"These gaps don't just impact individuals," Pranzo adds. "They impact city budgets, workforce pipelines, healthcare systems—everything."
While Gregory Pranzo's company builds dashboards, smart infrastructure, and automation tools for clients across sectors, he stresses that the solution isn't always high-tech. "Sometimes the most important thing you can do is help someone sign up for email or show them how to use a shared document," he said. "That's how change starts."
In 2024, Pranzo helped launch a citywide digital skills accelerator, training over 300 Baltimore residents in basic tech fluency. Many had never used a computer before. He also volunteers with Code B'More, a youth organization teaching coding and robotics in underserved neighborhoods. "We can't build smart cities if we leave whole communities digitally invisible," Pranzo emphasized.
Pranzo is urging individuals, businesses, and civic groups to take local ownership of digital access and education. Recommended actions include donating working laptops or tablets to community organizations, hosting or sponsoring free tech literacy workshops in schools, libraries, or rec centers, mentoring someone in your neighborhood or network who's learning digital skills, advocating for city budgets that support community technology staff and digital navigators, and designing tools and websites with non-experts in mind. "Innovation isn't about building for the top 1% of users," he says. "It's about making sure the bottom 30% can still participate."
