Nebraska
Department of Natural Resources
Thursday, February 19, 2004
The
GIS Steering Committee recommended that DNR initiate a process to create a unified,
enterprise-wide, Nebraska geospatial data clearinghouse with the goal of
ultimately providing a one-stop portal for searching geospatial data related to
Nebraska.
Using
Internet Map Server applications, the Data Bank recently developed and created
a Natural Resources Data Clearinghouse for dissemination of spatial data
available with the agency.
A metadata describes different
aspects of a dataset, including identification or name of the dataset. It describes who developed the database,
what geographic area is covered, what themes of information are included, the
currency and quality of the data, and any restrictions on accessing or using
the data. A metadata clearinghouse
would allow GIS users to conduct online searches for available geospatial data
related to the Nebraska geographic area.
The Department of Natural Resources initially developed
metadata for the coverages maintained in the Data Bank that meet the Federal
Geographic Data Committee standards.
Next
Step: The DNR needs to take necessary
action for the administration and management of an enterprise geospatial data
clearinghouse for the state. When
committed, the Data Bank would create a proper interface for creating
and supporting metadata for other state agencies.
The Committee
stipulated that following an 18-month period, the Department of Natural
Resources and the GIS Steering Committee would re-evaluate the policies,
barriers, opportunities and options for enterprise-wide geospatial data
sharing.
As part of the Nebraska I-Team
effort, the U. S. Geological Survey approached DNR to find if it would
participate in their creation of a National Map database and delivery of
geographic information services. Since
DNR has developed several Internet Map applications and is already providing
geospatial data and web map services to the public, the USGS would like DNR to
participate in making their data available through the National Map web portal.
The DNR has received a draft Memorandum of Understanding
from USGS for partnership in the National Map undertaking between the two
agencies. The critical part of the National Map is creation of an ArcIMS OGC
connector, which has already been installed by the Data Bank
staff, and has created a link to continually test the Nebraska Map site. The Data Bank staff is currently working on the data layers
and metadata pointers that the agency would like to include in the Technical
Aspects of the National Map Data Partnership.
Next Step: Agency’s commitment to participate in the
National Map initiative by the U. S. Geological Survey through MOA.
Item 4 Status of Database Development
Activities
Digital Elevation Models (DEMs)
In order to revise DOQs based on 1999
NAPP photography, the agency entered into a work share agreement with
USGS that included a joint effort to create statewide 10-meter Digital
Elevation Models. During 2000-2002, the
Data Bank completed statewide development of 10-meter DEMs. The
DEMs are produced in 7.5-minute quadrangle units, which correspond to USGS 7.5
topographic maps with contour lines spaced at 10 feet interval and drawn to
1:24,000 scale. The DEMs are referenced horizontally to NAD 27 and UTM
projections, and have a root mean square error (RMSE) of one half of the
contour interval. The elevation units are in feet relative to the National
Geodetic Vertical Datum of 1929 (NGVD29).
During 1995-1998, the agency
similarly developed 30-Meter interval, Level-2, 7.5-minute Digital Elevation
Models statewide, mapped to 1:24,000 scale.
Both these 10-Meter and the 30-Meter interval DEM databases are now
available on-line and dynamically retrievable over the Internet through the
Data Bank. The Department uses them for flood prone mapping, terrain modeling,
and planning purposes including development of NHDs.
Digital Orthophoto Quadrangles (DOQs)
In 1999,
on recommendations from the GIS Steering Committee, the agency entered into a work-share agreement with U. S. Geological
Survey to revise DOQs based on new 1999 source imagery projected in both
UTM and State Plane coordinates.
Recently, Data Bank completed statewide production of these DOQs, and
the last 3 blocks are under review of the U. S. Geological Survey. The project is anticipated for completion
by June 30, 2004. The DOQs also provide
a valuable visual backdrop for many abstract GIS maps and analyses, and as such
they are used for development of NHDs and other geo-spatial databases.
During
1995-1998, the agency produced one-meter resolution, 1:12,000 scale, Digital
Orthophoto Quadrangles (DOQs) for the State of Nebraska, based on 1993 NAPP
imagery. The Department uses them for
digitization of soil surveys, base mapping, and watershed planning purposes.
Other applications include precision farming, field mapping, land use
inventory, and project studies.
Both these 1993 and 1999 DOQs coverages are
available upon request and the compressed DOQs are disseminated over the
Internet through the Data Bank.
SSURGO Soil Surveys
The agency in
cooperation with the U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service, and the
Conservation and Survey Division, UNL, is digitizing county soil surveys that
meet national SSURGO (Soil Survey Geographic) standards. At this time, soil surveys of 90 counties
have been completed, and the statewide coverage is targeted for completion by
year 2004. The SSURGO database is
widely used for natural resources planning and management activities such as
farm and ranch planning, range and timber management, watershed resources
planning and management and others. The SSURGO database is available on-line
and dynamically retrievable over the Internet through the Data Bank.
National Hydrography Database (NHD)
The
agency, in cooperation with other state agencies, is developing high
resolution, 1:24,000 scale, National Hydrography Database (NHD) for Nebraska
that meet national standards. The
coverage includes surface water features including lakes, ponds, streams,
canals and shorelines. Each of these features has the attributes of a name and
feature identification code. This database is widely used for analysis and
modeling of water supply, pollution, flood hazard, wildlife, development and
land suitability. The product of this project is digitized Nebraska streams
into GIS coverages according to national standards. Available NHD coverages are disseminated over the Internet through the Data Bank.
Item 5 Proposed
Changes in Data Bank Fee Schedule
DVD Blanks - $5/each
CD Blanks - $1/each
Item 6 IT
Review Committee Recommendations
The IT Review report of March 31, 2003 conducted by CIO provides a good
comprehensive overview of the IT functions of DNR. It recognizes that the Department’s IT activities traditionally
have been at the cutting edge of the technological curve. The report makes several important
recommendations for enhancing inter-agency and intra-agency coordination to
ensure operational efficiency as well as effectiveness, and at the same time
continue to build on its IT expertise and technological excellence.
The report recognizes that the Data Bank now performs a range of
responsibilities that go beyond the original statutory mandate. Over the years, these additional functions
have evolved in the Data Bank in response to increasing demands of GIS, web and
IT technologies, reflecting the recognition that the Data Bank is uniquely and
technically equipped to meet such needs.
It would be appropriate that these additional functions eventually
become reflected in the Statute. The
report speaks of an overlap between the functions of the Data Bank Technical
Advisory Committee and the GIS Steering Committee. The excerpts from the above
Report are given below:
IT Review Committee Findings
and Recommendations
Finding I:
Data Bank Statutes. A review of the Data Bank statutes (Sections
2-1568 to 2-1570) generated several conclusions:
1.
The activities of the Data Bank Technical Advisory Committee
are very similar to some of the functions of the GIS Steering Committee;
2.
The Data Bank statutes no longer reflect the full range of
data development and data sharing of information pertaining to natural
resources that DNR provides;
3.
The concept of a central data repository, which is implicit
in Section 2-1568, does not reflect options for linking to data that are
maintained by other entities on their own computing equipment;
4.
The GIS Steering Committee has made recommendations for
facilitating geo-spatial data sharing. Some of these recommendations are
similar to the original purpose of the Data Bank statutes, but exceed existing
statutory authority in several respects.
Areas of differences include:
·
State statutes restrict membership of the Data Bank
Technical Advisory Committee to representatives of state and federal
agencies. The GIS Steering Committee
has broader representation, including local government and other political
subdivisions.
·
Section 2-1569 limits the activities of the Data Bank to a
list of twelve types of “basic data” pertaining to soil and water
resources. Recommendations of the GIS
Steering Committee address all geo-spatial data.
·
The Data Bank statutes direct DNR to “maintain and
administer a data bank in the field of soil and water resources.” Besides a broader range of data, the
recommendations of the GIS Steering Committee include responsibilities in these
other areas: geo-spatial data
clearinghouse, FGDC-compliant metadata, on-line catalog and data access point,
help desk, data integration, interactive Internet mapping, technical
assistance, and pooling of resources.
·
The Data Bank statutes pertain only to DNR. The strategy of the GIS Steering Committee
anticipates a collaborative approach to projects that would involve active
partnerships with other entities. In
particular, the report recommends collaboration between DNR and the University.
Recommendation
H:
Data Bank
Statutes. DNR should propose
changes to the Data Bank statutes, Sections 2-1568 through 2-1570. The changes should:
1.
Replace the Technical Advisory Committee with a formal
relationship to the GIS Steering Committee to advise DNR on collecting and
disseminating geo-spatial information and providing assistance in the use of
such data.
2.
Expand the definition of “basic data” to include the full
range of geo-spatial data and related information.
3.
Give explicit recognition to multiple options for
administering, disseminating, and maintaining data, including the practice of
linking to data that are maintained by other entities on their own computing
equipment.
4.
Authorize DNR to participate in other activities, including
those recommended by the GIS Steering Committee (geo-spatial data
clearinghouse, FGDC-compliant metadata, on-line catalog and data access point,
help desk, data integration, interactive Internet mapping, technical
assistance, and pooling of resources).
5.
Authorize DNR to enter into partnerships with other entities
to achieve the goals for expanding access and improving the use of geo-spatial
data.
6.
Recognize the responsibility of the director of DNR to
manage the staff, budget and other resources of DNR and to set priorities for
meeting the needs of the department.
Recommendation
I:
GIS Clearinghouse. DNR should develop a memorandum of agreement
with the GIS Steering Committee (Recommendation 2, “Facilitating Geospatial
Data Sharing in Nebraska,” 9/4/02). DNR
should also implement Recommendation 6(g) of the same report regarding a formal
collaborative relationship with the University for operating an “enterprise
geospatial data center.” Both of these
actions would be steps toward a broader role in facilitating geospatial data
sharing that could be accomplished with no additional commitment of resources.
Clearly, there is an overlap in
this respect, as the report notes, and suggested statutory change might be
warranted with respect to the requirement of a separate Data Bank Technical
Advisory Committee.
Data Bank Laws/ Statutes:
By statutes, the Technical Advisory Committee to Data Bank
assists in the coordination and dissemination of the resources of the Data
Bank. This committee consists of nine
representatives of state and federal agencies concerned with the collection,
interpretation and use of basic data, whose members are appointed by the
Governor. Also, the Committee
reports to, assists, and advises the Chief Information Officer in setting
information technology policy and provides assistance as requested by the
department to support the technical panel created by NITC.
(Laws 1969, c 382, Art. 3, p. 1349; Laws 1998, LB 924, Art.
15; Laws 2000, LB 900, Art. 25)
The Nebraska GIS Steering Committee, consisting of 18
members, makes recommendations to the Governor for program initiatives and
funding, and advises in the acquisition, development, maintenance, QA/QC,
standards, access, ownership, cost recovery and priorities of databases. By statutes, the Department of Natural
Resources represents on this Committee.
The Intergovernmental Data Communications Advisory Council,
consisting of 13 members, was created in 1987 to study and suggest ways to
improve the collection, use, and exchange of electronic data among state
agencies and political subdivisions.
The natural Resources Data Bank is a member of this Committee.
Advisory Committee - Current Membership and
Alternates:
Mark Kuzila – Conservation and
Survey Division, UNL
Steve Schafer – Nebraska
Department of Administrative Services (Lori McClurg)
John Erickson – Governor’s Policy
Research Office (Lauren Hill)
Jack Daniel – Nebraska Health
Services System (Richard Nelson)
Tom Lamberson – Nebraska
Department of Environmental Quality (Mike Linder)
Rex Amack – Nebraska Game and
Parks Commission
Marlyn Carlson – Nebraska
Department of Agriculture
Luis Hernandez – Natural Resources
Conservation Service, USDA (Steve Chick)
Phil Soenksen - U. S. Geological
Survey (Michael Slifer)
Item 8 Data
Bank Activities
Processing and Acquisition of Federal Databases
By statutes, the Data Bank acquires basic soil and water data collected by various state and federal agencies for dissemination in the Data Bank. This includes climatic, stream flows, groundwater, water quality, wetlands, census, soils, topography and other base data. For purposes of convenience, this data is currently acquired directly from the agency on CD media or through a vendor. It is then reorganized and processed in the Data Bank, and published over the web for dissemination. This provides users and stakeholders a single point of contact for the natural resources data pertaining to the state.
Most of this
data is also available at the web sites of federal agencies where it is
acquired from. A few agencies may
charge for the data disseminated over the web like the National Climatic
Center, NOAA. The duplication of
efforts could be avoided, if the Data Bank provides a link to this processed
data rather than process itself.
In a long-standing partnership under a state-federal
cooperative program, as designated by the Governor, the Department of Natural
Resources has participated with the U. S. Bureau of the Census in the data
compilation and estimates review of annual population estimates at the state,
county and sub-county geographic levels for the state. Annual county estimates and biennial
estimates for incorporated places and minor civil divisions have become
standard products.
It is a commitment of resources by a state agency to
continue to fulfill a level of participation by signing a three-year MOA and an
annual work plan each year. The Data
Bank leads in this effort. As part of
the FSCPE contact, the Data Bank assists the Census Bureau in conducting its
decennial censuses. It is a member of
the State Data Center consortium, and receives all relevant population, housing
and economic census publications concerning the state.
Item 9 Other Activities
Efforts are continued to automate
agency business forms such as well registrations, water rights, soil and water
conservation fund (cost-share) applications, ice jam status reports, dam
inspections, stream flow observations and others for use by agency and the
public, and provide interactive access online over the Internet.
Both
relational and GIS databases produced both by this agency and/or acquired from
other state, federal and local data collecting agencies, are processed and
managed in the Data Bank. These
databases are updated on a regular basis (at least once in a year) and
published over the web for user access and dissemination purposes.
On-line Registration of Water Wells (Continued
Activity)
The registration of water wells over the Internet, mandated
by Legislature, is completed. Next step
is to re-write the process for SQL-server data base management system sometime
after the Surface Water database is up and running on SQL-server. The database uniquely identifies the groundwater
wells registered in the state for irrigation, municipal, industrial and other
groundwater needs. Currently, the
on-line Well Registration database is updated daily and is dynamically
retrievable over the Internet through the Data Bank.
The data base enhancements include creation of a history,
file, well permits file, and integration with other associated files. The
future plans are to properly identify all existing groundwater (registered,
monitoring and observation) wells using GPS technology, create a credible
spatial database, and interface with associated relational components.
Automation
of Surface Water Rights database
This is a multi-phase project. Phase one consists in migrating
data currently on the mainframe into an in-house SQL-server database with a
Windows based interface to enter and edit the data records. A new web
interface will be developed for this data using Active Server Pages to increase
the speed of access and ease of use. Currently, testing of Phase 1 is in
progress. In Phase two, data not
currently stored on the mainframe, will be incorporated into the database
including pending modifications, map approvals, owner/tenant information, and
other related data. Phase three is the linking of this tabular database
with map data in GIS format. This map information would include field
boundaries indicating what lands are irrigated with associated water
rights. Phase four includes the linking of this database to other
databases like Dams and Payment Receipts. Later phases would include
on-line application for new rights or changes to existing water rights.
Paper
water rights maps are currently being converted into electronic files so that
they can be reproduced or layered with other data as needed. Current
plans are to digitize the maps by November 2004 and to develop programming to
assist in using the digital information. Ultimately the maps are to also
be linked to tabular water rights data.
Groundwater Levels Interactive Mapping
Internet Map Server Applications
The Data Bank is developing Internet Map Server (IMS)
applications for interactive processing and display of DOQs and Flood Prone
Area maps available within the agency. This application allows users to
display, pan, zoom, identify and locate user-defined map coverages over the
web. Similar IMS applications have
previously been developed for Well Registration and Census 2000 databases. The process includes implementing
SQL Server and ArcSDE database management systems.
Nebraska Ice
Jam Reporting System
The Nebraska Ice Jam Reporting System (available through the DNR
website) was developed in response to discussions with the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers after the 1993 spring floods.
A network of site observers was formed to make river observations during
peak ice forming and breakup periods.
These observations (which are either faxed to the DNR or entered
directly over the Internet) are compiled in a password-protected database and
are available over the Internet. The
data serves two purposes: First, it provides up-to-date information on the
status of rivers which decision makers and people living along the river can
use to assess risk; and second, it will provide long-term data repository that
can be used in the future to develop models to predict where ice jams and
associated flooding are most likely to occur based on the weather conditions.
Governmental Units Geographic Boundary Coverages
These include geographic areas/boundary coverages of
governmental units recognized in the state, such as counties, NRDs, river
basins, basic hydrologic units, major streams, cities, legislative districts,
fire districts, and township boundaries. These political boundary coverages are
dynamically retrievable over the Internet through the Data Bank. However, these coverages remain to be
revised and updated.
Data Publishing and Web Enhancements
The agency continually enhances
its website to broaden and extend Internet access to agency's data using Active
Server Pages, Visual Basic, "C", PERL, Java Script, and associated
relational data base management techniques. The purpose is to promote data
sharing and dissemination of information to government agencies and the general
public in a user-friendly and timely manner.
The databases that are updated and developed are continually published
over the Internet.
Next Step: Enhance data
sharing and dissemination using ASP.NET, Internet Map Server, and web
development techniques.
Enhancement of Public Land
Survey System (Section Corners) Database
The agency in the early 1980’s digitized the section corners statewide
using paper copies of the USGS 7.5-minute quadrangle maps drawn to 1:24,000
Scale. It later processed the digitized information using GIS techniques and
created a Public Land Survey System (PLSS) database for use by the agency. The
data resolution is 50 meters approximately.
In the early 1990’s, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, in coordination
with other federal agencies, also digitized the section corners of
Nebraska. The digitizing process was
identical to this agency. This
provided an opportunity to check and compare both databases. After extracting, processing and merging
both databases, a synthesized data set resulted which is of better quality and
accuracy than either of the databases previously developed by both agencies in
isolation.
The DNR is planning to further refine this database by mapping section
corners derived from the Digital Orthophoto Quadrangles (DOQ) developed by the
agency at 1-meter resolution. . It will
provide a common reference system for establishing land coordinates for any
geographic coverage.