HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY INTERNET SAFETY EDUCATION INITIATIVE
c/o Library Services of Hillsborough and County Commissioner Hagan, Manus O’Donnell, Asst. County Administrator, Lori Hudson, Director, Hillsborough County Communications Dept.

CURRENT ISSUES:
When the results from national studies are applied to the population of school-aged children in Hillsborough County, the implications are that over 55,000 annually are exposed to unsolicited sexual material, and that over 6,500 youths receive aggressive sexual solicitation, are pursued to meet offline, and/or asked for nude or sexually explicit photos.

GOAL:
To expand safety awareness of internet predators as well as to help prevent the victimization of children, and increase their self-confidence whenever they go online. To this end, our goal is to have a minimum of 10,000 school aged children complete the NetSmartz Internet Safety program June 1st, 2008.  January and February of 2008 will be our Kick-Off and Awareness Month.

PARTNERS:
To address this alarming reality, Hillsborough County Library Services, in conjunction with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) has recently installed the NetSmartz training software on all its free public computers and it will soon be available at all recreation centers and in the computer labs of elementary and middle schools. It is believed this broad-reaching, proactive, participatory program is the first of its kind in the country.

CALL FOR COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
This will be a highly visible program and a pilot program that will ultimately roll out to other counties within the state.  Due to the scope of this program we are looking for additional assistance in the following areas:

• Creative      
• Signage       
• Specialty Advertising   
• Copywriting
• Public Relations       
• Marketing       
• Billboard       
• Video production
• Advertising       
• Radio/TV       
• Direct Mail       
• Website

Most meetings with the County’s committee will likely be held after normal business hours from 5-7 p.m. at a downtown location (either the County Center or the Public Library).  Our first meetings will begin the first week in October and continue through February of 2008.

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:
Diane Broady
Partnership Marketing, Inc.
813-837-6335
Cell 352-895-2491
dlbroady@aol.com