Update 9: ESRI Invites Support for GIS for the Nation as Part of Stimulus Bill
Update 2/9/09: John Palatiello shared this proposal with National Geospatial Advisory Committee (NGAC) last week. Do read the author’s note that explains this proposal has not been submitted to anyone, nor does it have any endorsements. You can learn more about the NGAC meeting in tomorrow’s podcast.
—- update 2/2/09————-
Update 2/2/09: ESRI has added a “comments” e-mail address to its Building a National GIS website. You can submit comments to: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
——- update 1/28/09————
Update 1/28: COGO shared its letter of Jan 26 to Senator Harry Reid regarding the “National Geospatial Infrastructure & Economic Recovery.” In short the letter:
...supports Congressional action in the stimulus package to fund the development of a complete national geospatial infrastructure, the databases and technologies that create infrastructure base maps, which will serve as a public resource for project planners to support transportation infrastructure, water resource management, alternative energy research, and project siting. Such an infrastructure will also provide a foundation for monitoring the US economic recovery across our communities, allowing activities to get underway as soon as possible and leaving a valuable legacy for our future.
There is no mention of any specific proposal. However, the COGO website does note the member organizations that support the “Building a National GIS” proposal.
COGO’s most recent action related to Congress was a letter requesting House and Senate committees be assigned oversight of geospatial activities in the federal government (press release). That was on January 6th.
——- Update 1/23/09———
Update 1/23: New endorsements include the National Association of Counties (NACo), the National Association of County Engineers, the Trust for Public Lands, and URISA. Links to some of their endorsement letters are at the GIS Nation website.
——- Update 1/21/09———-
Update 1/21: A forwarded e-mail yesterday revealed that Jack Dangermond presented the proposal on Wed January 7 to a gathering. It included the Dangermond and Miglarese bylined document. It also noted that Dangermond planned to “to selected Members of Congress and the incoming Administration.”
Also, on Monday, 1/19, NSGIC president sent its endorsement letter to five Congresspersons. Details on the NSGIC blog.
UCGIS’ endorsement appeared on the gisnation site.
————-Update 1/16/09———
Update 4: 4 pm: ERSI is actively asking for support for its proposal. ESRI has not responded to Directions calls for comment as of yet, but I did find this e-mail sourced ultimately to ESRI Charlotte posted on Cartotalk.
Subject: ...FW: GIS for the Nation Information
ESRI is supporting a proposal for a GIS for the Nation as part of the Obama Stimulus package. The time is short in getting this activity into the stimulus bill. We need your help in reaching out to the GIS community. Please review the proposal and ppt presentation on http://www.gis.com/gisnation/and decide if you would be willing to contact your Congressperson or Executive Management to support the proposal. You can use the following message as a basis for your communication:
The United States Congress is strongly considering funding the GIS for the Nation as part of the economic stimulus package. We are reaching out to organizations and individuals we believe would benefit from the decision to build a national GIS.
A National GIS promises many benefits including creating jobs, providing funding to the private sector, supporting state and local governments with planned infrastructure projects, and creating a series of base data for responding to local and national disasters. Some other key benefits include:
o Creation of 24,000 high tech jobs
o Cost savings by making government more efficient
o Better decisions based on accurate and timely data
o A more competitive America
o Stimulus money allocated by geography
o Transparency of funded projects.The time frame to receive support is very short. To learn more about this proposal, please visit http://www.gis.com/gisnation/. We invite you to join us in this effort by sending a note to your representatives in Congress asking them to support this proposal.
Regards,
...
ESRI-Charlotte
...
—- update 8:30 am 1/16/09——-
Update 1/16/09: American Forests joins the group of endorsers. Its letter of support is online.
—- update 1/14/09—-
Update 1/14/09: Two more organizations are endorsing the plan: AAG (Association of American Geographers) and IMTA (International Map Trade Association). IMTA and NatureServe are not in COGO, if you are keeping score. So, endorsements seem to be appearing from a variety of organizations. You can read the IMTA endorsement here.
—- update 1/13/09—-
Update (1:44 EST): The “official site” for this effort is titled Building a National GIS. There you’ll find a pdf of a PowerPoint presentation outlining the argument for “Building a National GIS.” There’s also an ESRI federal government brochure (pdf). There’s also the non-bylined version of the PDF noted below. None of the documents have dates, so I suspect they are very new.
Finally, the website notes two endorsements for this effort. One is from GITA (endorsement letter), the other from NatureServe.
——original post 11 am EST——
A short trail of folks passed along ESRI’s efforts to encourage “GIS for the Nation” as part of the Stimulus Bill currently in Congress. From what I understand on Sunday ESRI met with Congresspersons and staffers on matter. The idea is to continue the momentum to get a proposal into the bill.
The e-mail notes: “Wording for this initiative needs to be in the Bill within a 36 hour period of time and then there will need to be congressional support to make sure it passes. Please have your key contacts and management send an endorsement to your respective congressional member or anyone on the Obama transition team to ensure this gets into the Bill.”
Also included was a white paper titled “A Proposal for National Economic Recovery”. I found another version here (the only difference - the one circulated didn’t include author names).
