Hosted by NorCal URISA, SoCal URISA, CentralCal URISA, and CGIA, the 18th annual CalGIS conference continued a long-standing tradition of supporting [...]]]> CalGIS 2012

Congratulations to Dan Henderson, NorCal URISA, and his CalGIS 2012 Planning Committee for a great conference. Along with URISA event managers Wendy Nelson and Pat Francis, CalGIS 2012 was a great success.

Hosted by NorCal URISA, SoCal URISA, CentralCal URISA, and CGIA, the 18th annual CalGIS conference continued a long-standing tradition of supporting the GIS community in our state.

Almost three hundred GIS professionals joined the 28 sponsors for the three-day event that included pre-conference meetings, training sessions, a levee tour, two exceptional keynote speakers, 42 presentations, 7 poster presentations, and 12 enthusiastic, fast talking speakers during the Ignite session.

CalGIS is an important event for GIS professionals and plans for 2013 will be starting soon; stay tuned for location and dates.

CGIA Awards

Each year CGIA presents awards for excellence in GIS. It is an opportunity to recognize and honor those who do exemplary work or contribute to our industry in a huge way.

This year four individuals, nominated by their peers, received awards:

Chairman’s Award – granted to honor a person who has made outstanding contributions in promotion, innovation, and/or use of technology.

Dave Hansen, GISP, Soils Scientist/GIS Specialist, USBR

Dave has contributed immensely to the GIS community at all levels. He is a consistent and dependable resource who never turns down an opportunity to provide assistance to those in need in the GIS community. He has been described as a diplomat who is fair and helpful to all as well as a mentor to the highest degree.

Advancement of Collaboration Award – granted for outstanding inter-organization and collaborative efforts in GIS.

Kris Lynn-Patterson, GIS Academic Coordinator, UC Div. Ag and Natural Resources

Kris has done outreach to the California agricultural community which has grown over the years. Bringing together the ag community and scientists through the use of collaborative geospatial technology has been achieved with interactive web sites and mapping. The information gathered and studied can and will produce data that can be studied and shared providing important information for current and future decisions. Using GIS as the main tool for these endeavors not only promotes GIS but facilitates awareness of this powerful tool. As agriculture embraces technology, Kris has used GIS as an important component to ag and scientific research.

Outstanding Internet Presentation Award – granted for the outstanding integration of GIS and web technologies demonstrating in aesthetic presentation, functionality, and overall ease of use.

Mark Greninger, GIO, Chief Information Office, Los Angeles County

CGIA was in great need of revamping its web presence. It needed to be interactive, informative, and contemporary. As a member of the web committee and with direction from the board, Mark launched right into setting up a proto-type and then moving the site to production. He took concepts and turned them into workable tangibles. His efforts go far above and beyond the expectations of a volunteer board member, benefitting CGIA and the entire GIS community.

Exemplary Systems Award – granted for outstanding application of GIS technology representing innovative, elegant, or creative techniques.

Keith Russell, Ramona Water District

Keith has worked in the industry since 1986 and has a degree in engineering and computer science. After a varied career in several agencies, he went to work for a small water district in southern California to work on what he called, at the time, and ERP framework for GIS and document management. This framework can read and write to various formats of spatial, vector, and spatial database formats including ESRI’s SDE, Oracle Spatial, SQL Server 2008, Katimi, and others; but it is primarily a document management system. This framework serves as a base for the entire enterprise without the use of any third party software products; it just focuses on the data.

Congratulations to all the honorees.

Remember, you’re invited!

On Friday, April 27th, CGIA is hosting the second annual Geospatial Summit Series (GSS) in partnership with UC Merced on the beautiful campus of UC Merced.  The GSS will showcase Using GIS to Improve Our Communities. The event is free and scheduled from 8:30 AM – 3:00 PM, with speakers from the GIS Community and various community groups in the Central Valley. Online registration and event information can be found at: http://communityresearch.ucmerced.edu/. You must be registered, and registration closes Monday April 23rd.  Hope to see you there.

Good News!

Several GIS User Groups around the state are starting up again.  CGIA will be listing them on the GIS User Groups page on the website as we are notified.  Check with others in your area for a group near you.

Now that 2011 has faded into memory, 2012 is off to a busy start.

The new and improved CGIA Website has been growing with added content, news of GIS classes at various colleges and universities, and upcoming GIS events.  CGIA now has PayPal back on track for electronic payment of dues.  The ability [...]]]> Hello everyone,

Now that 2011 has faded into memory, 2012 is off to a busy start.

The new and improved CGIA Website has been growing with added content, news of GIS classes at various colleges and universities, and upcoming GIS events.  CGIA now has PayPal back on track for electronic payment of dues.  The ability to select your membership option, make the payment, and receive a receipt has never been easier.  As an additional benefit to membership, the board is working on a “members only” section for resource documents.  As a member of CGIA you will have access to information used by other members for RFP’s, justifications for budget items, white papers, reports, or presentations.

CalGIS is fast approaching, April 11th – 13th in Sacramento.  This is the one and only conference all about GIS in California.  In addition to the many great presentations this year, the conference is also offering workshops, technical courses, and a levee tour.  On Wednesday, in addition to the CGIA open meeting  and the California GIS Council meeting, there are two half-day events, included in your conference registration:  Hazus and California, and the GIS Certification and Future Trends.

There are two great keynote speakers for the conference this year:  Scott Gregory, California GIO on Thursday and Dr. Dawn Wright on Friday.  Both of these professionals have extensive backgrounds in GIS and will definitely be a highlight of the conference.

Also on Thursday the conference is hosting:  CalGIS Townhall 2012.  Attendees will share their perspectives about issues impacting the profession in this open forum – a definite “must see”.

This is the premier GIS event in and about California.  One of the key benefits to attendees is the professional networking with your peers and the opportunity to check out all the new technology offered by our Sponsors.  Check out the website:  www.calgis.org.  Hope you will be able to attend!

Here is the welcome from CalGIS Conference Chair, Dan Henderson.

“Spatial technology has become part of the day to day activities for almost everyone. Getting directions on Google Maps, Check-ins on Facebook and foursquare, or finding the nearest restaurant are things we now take for granted whether we do it on a mobile device or at our desktop. Our global geographic connectivity is at an all time high!

Geospatial and technology professions are becoming more tightly connected as well, putting an emphasis on system integration, spatially intelligent data management, as well web and mobile enabled connectivity. In the State of California, we are at the centroid of many of these advances. As geospatial professionals, it is vital that we connect with others in our field and across disciplines to help address the many complex problems we face as a society including increasing the efficiency of data collection, linking financial, GIS, and maintenance systems to ensure a singular data inputs and outputs, and enabling the vast amount of data we collect via GPS, remote sensing, census surveys or even crowd sourcing can be analyzed and made sense of by decisions makers and stakeholders.

At CalGIS 2012, we want to make the move from a predominately GIS-centric view to looking at technology as a whole and how spatial information and analysis can reduce costs, increase access to information, and enable non-GIS professionals to benefit from the types of tools and applications we often take for granted.

Think about these themes as you attend sessions and meet and mingle with your geospatial fellow professionals in Sacramento this year. Capitalize on the Spatial intelligence gathered for the 14^th year of this conference! I look forward to having inspired discussions and learning about the advances we achieved, both in technology and in policy that we as the stewards of our profession in California must strive to push forward. “

Full job posting: http://www.usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/311432900

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Well, we made it another year! Thanksgiving is a delicious memory and Christmas is right around the corner, and 2012 is looming large for all of us.

There is some news for the GIS community as we round out 2011. CGIA has moved its website to the WordPress platform, and the entire board will be [...]]]> Hello everyone,

Well, we made it another year! Thanksgiving is a delicious memory and Christmas is right around the corner, and 2012 is looming large for all of us.

There is some news for the GIS community as we round out 2011. CGIA has moved its website to the WordPress platform, and the entire board will be contributing to the content. The Website Committee headed up by Laurie Kurilla, Ventura County, has been working on making all of this come to life. Many thanks to Mark Greninger, LA County, for doing most of the heavy lifting and educating the board members on how to contribute content. The committee and the board will be moving forward on adding new content, GIS news items, job opportunities, and events. Please feel free to share any information with us for posting on the website.

In other news around the state, the California GIS Council now has a new Chair and Vice Chair. Scott Gregory, State GIO in the California Technology Agency, is the Chair and Harold Feinberg from Caltrans is the Vice Chair. I’m sure we all wish them well and will be able to offer support for GIS in California.

On the lighter side, I’m sure many of you have heard that NORAD tracks Santa. This is a fun activity to do with your family that kind of showcases what we all do. For those of you who have not heard of it, this has been a popular family activity since 1955. The NORAD Tracks Santa (NTS) program began on Dec. 24, 1955, after an errant phone call was made to the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Operations Center in Colorado Springs, Colo. The call was from a local youngster who dialed a misprinted telephone number in a local newspaper advertisement. The commander who answered the phone that night gave the youngster the information requested – the whereabouts of Santa Claus – and thus began the tradition. Christmas 2011 marks the 56th anniversary of NORAD tracking Santa Claus as he goes around the world delivering presents.

The website became active on December 1st www.noradsanta.org. In addition, there is a North Pole website http://www.northpole.com/ that has fun facts and games for family members to play. You can also follow him on Facebook: www.facebook.com/noradsanta; Twitter:  @noradsanta; Google: http://m.google.com/p/santatracker; as well as apps for smart phones.

Getting to know your CGIA Board Members

This month I would like to introduce you to our board members Kris Lynn-Patterson from Education and David Peck serving as Vice-Chair.

Kris Lynn-Patterson is a GIS Academic Coordinator for University of California Kearney Agricultural Center. She has worked with geospatial technologies for the last 20 years as an educator and as a professional Geographic Information Systems (GIS) manager. Kris taught formal classes in Geography and GIS at CSU Fresno and Fresno City College, and for five years was the GIS and Remote Sensing Specialist for a large insurance corporation, where she introduced geo-technologies for crops. At Kearney Agricultural Center, Kris collaborates with Principal Investigators to produce maps from their research data. Building a solid GIS foundation available to the research effort at KAC, and building linkages to the greater UC, and California State GIS resource base is the focus of Kris’ work. With those goals in mind, Kris developed the “Bi-Annual Geospatial Technologies in Agriculture Symposium” to acquaint the agricultural research community with GIS. Several times a year, she organizes Ag-Specialty User Group Meetings where those in agriculture can share their experiences using Geospatial Technologies on their farms as well as in the research lab.

Kris’ most current work has been developing online GIS resources for agricultural research. Most notably is the citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program Interactive Mapping Interface to Monitor and Protect California’s Citrus from Invasive, Exotic Pests and Diseases. http://crbcitrussurvey.uckac.edu/viewer/

KAC GIS home website: www.gis.uckac.edu

David Peck is the District Manager for Pictometry International, Inc. He has spent the last 15 years working within the Geo-Spatial world specializing in the growing function of GIS and remote sensing in Public Safety (911, Crime Investigation, Fire Hazard Management), Government Assessment, and Residential Real Estate. His experience in GIS includes data creation, data management and data deployment. His experience in remote sensing includes aerial oblique and orthogonal imagery capture, aerial imagery deployment and aerial imagery use training in 911, public safety and assessment environments. David holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Geography (GIS-Cartography concentration) from California State University Long Beach. David is active in the GIS community serving as Vice Chairman of the California Geographic Information Association whose purpose is to facilitate the coordination, collaboration, and advocacy for California’s GIS community. David is also a member of numerous GIS user groups within California actively speaking to audiences about the role of GIS and aerial imagery in State, County and local governments. Currently David works for Pictometry International, a provider of visual intelligence solutions in the role of District Manager. In this role he is actively engaged in the sale, capture, delivery, implementation, training and support of aerial imagery, 3d technology and web deployment.

Remember, the URISA Chapters’ websites are also great resources for classes and meetings taking place near you. Here are the websites for your reference:

CentralCal URISA:   www.centralcalurisa.org

NorCal URISA:         www.urisa.org/norcal_chapter

SoCal URISA:          www.socaluris.org

Bay Area Automated Mapping Association BAAMA: www.baama.org

The website for CalGIS 2012 is active: www.urisa.org/calgis/info/). This premier conference for GIS in our state will be in Sacramento April 11-13, 2012 at the downtown Sheraton. The program is full of great presentations and excellent speakers. Check the website often for updates. Hope to see you all there.

Getting to know your colleagues in the the GIS Community is a great way to find new resources and sharing of ideas. Together we all make a greater difference.

On behalf of CGIA, I would like to wish all of you and your families a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year.

If you are looking for documents to help you establish GIS governance for you organization, it is recommended reading.

Visualizing California: A Strategy for Enhanced Decision-making Tools for Public Policy Makers and the Public

The Extend the Reach of Your GIS seminar teaches GIS professionals how to expand the access to their authoritative maps and geospatial information. Esri staff will present practical applications and demonstrations that reflect common workflows.

This seminar will help you: