Northern Ireland to Redo GIS (L9m) and other International GIS News

Northern Ireland

The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) in Northern Ireland is setting up a £9m contract for an enterprise-wide geographic information system (GIS).

It is aimed at correcting shortcomings in the existing GIS and its Land Parcel Information System function, which have been in place since December 2004. The department said the system is also intended to meet a range of requirements for itself and its executive agencies.

The project is part of DARD's EU Audit Compliance Programme aimed at mitigating the risk of EU penalties.

#NSGIC Signs onto Amicus Brief in Support of Open Data

After a great deal of discussion among its Board members, NSGIC has joined as Amicus Curiae in a Brief to be submitted to the Supreme Court of the State of California. The Brief supports the appeal of a Superior Court decision that we believe mischaracterizes geospatial data as “software,” thus allowing Orange County to charge very high data access fees under the California Public Records Act. NSGIC is concerned that this decision, should it be upheld, may become cited as case law and replicated in other jurisdictions. This would diminish efforts to make geospatial data available to all levels of government and the public. NSGIC takes this position in support of its vision of open data sharing. It is important to note that while NSGIC has signed the Brief and supports the concept, certain strong language choices within the document gave us pause. We do not believe that Orange County intentionally misled the Court through its testimony.

- NSGIC News

Quote of the Week - 2/27/12

“The difference between GIS and an autocad environment is you can really do analysis because you’re able to pull out all that information that’s in that database that’s married to the map.”

- Brenda Wilson of GIS Workshop Inc. explaining the value of GIS to Dodge County, Nebraska officials, quoted in the Fremont Tribune.

Columbia County, GA Launches CitySourced and other Government GIS News

Columbia County, GA is using CitySourced's Citizen Reporter. After looking at the directions for download for the five different platforms, I wonder if it's time for HTML5, even if it must run on more than one browser.

- ABC 6

In Rancho Cucamongo, CA there's an iOS ony solution (Android coming): RC2GO "features directories of dining and shopping options within the city. Users can determine, for example, how many Thai food restaurants are in the city or the location of the nearest coffee shop." And, you can report potholes and graffitti, too.

The app was a joint project between the city and CyberTech, an information technology company with offices in Redlands. The city wanted to create an app that was useful and one that would make it easier to communicate with City Hall.

[Title]Embracing Google Earth

[Teaser] Five years ago, Google Earth worried government officials. But agencies have since realized that the benefits of high-resolution, up-to-date imagery of our Earth outweigh the risks.

That's how Jessica Mulholland, associate editor of GOVERNING, and associate editor of both Government Technology and Public CIO magazines, describes the use of platform in local and state government. 

- Governing

The New York State Liquor Authority launched its map that shows every current and pending liquor license in the state andany disciplinary actions taken by the agency against the licensee. The data used to require a FOIA request. (APB coverage). Tech: Fountains Spatial, ArcGIS Flex, Bing, Google StreetView. This is an interface I'd have my students explore! Did not work well in Safari.

- Times Union

Oregon is filtering data from Data.gov to its own state portal.

Locating data from the state and Data.gov portals can be cumbersome due to the abundance of data available, [Deputy State CIO Sean] McSpaden said. “What we’ve done initially is establish the connection. Over time, our plan is to work with Socrata on filtering so that only Oregon-specific [federal] data is present or accessible on our site,” he said.

To differentiate between what’s Oregon data and what’s federal data, McSpaden said Socrata is using icons on Data.Oregon.gov to indicate who owns what. 

- GovTech

Local Paper on Esri Federal GIS Conference #esrifedcon

The Washington Bureau of the Press Enterprise was at the event to interview Dangermond and cover Esri's move the cloud. I found this quote from U.S. Interior Deputy Secretary David Hayes' presentation noteworthy.

We now have the power to make information digestible for the people who lead your agency. I get mesmerized by Jack Dangermond and his people, and what they can do.

- Press Enterprise