The St. Johns River Water Management District (District), one of five water management districts covering the state of Florida, is charged with assuring the quantity and quality of the water resources in the State of Florida. The St. Johns River Water Management District covers 12,400 square miles and encompasses all or part of 19 counties. Extensive surface and ground water features abound in the District; the primary source of potable water in the District comes from ground water. The District manages the use of water resources to provide the greatest good for the residents of the state, while at the same time protecting these vital yet fragile resources. Toward this goal of managing these resources, GIS emerged as an integral tool.
Over the past few years District staff expressed a growing interest in the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to enhance daily work. As technology continues to emerge, this interest has quickly turned to an excitement with the possibilities an integrated GIS offers. GIS offers a powerful tool for managing the vast amounts of permitting and related data that the District collects. GIS also provides a potent tool for analyzing and evaluating these data.
The Department of Resource Management (Resource Management), one of six departments which comprise the District, employs 200 people, whose expertise ranges from environmental science, to engineering, to records management. The department handles all administrative processing of permits and applications, application review, and ensuring compliance to issued permits and rules. Until the recent District reorganization, GIS never played a significant role in Resource Management. Two key components for applying GIS technology successfully, that were previously lacking within Resource Management prior to the reorganization, were (1) trained GIS professionals, (2) and a Wide Area Network (WAN). Both of these issues have been addressed over the last two years.
Implementation strategies for GIS at the District changed over the course of the last ten years. Historically, those in charge of GIS technology consisted of technical workers attempting to solve particular problems, and GIS proved very effective in solving these problems. GIS provided a solution to specific project problems. Prior to 1989, the District gathered data in discrete project areas. This situation resulted in the inconsistent and sporadic gathering of spatial data throughout the District. The District needed an understanding and vision of how GIS could be used effectively as an organizational tool.
Over the past five years, the District systematically identified and gathered GIS data layers for the entire District. Currently, the District maintains over 70 data layers. Initially used by a limited number of projects and primarily as a map making tool, the use of GIS now spreads to almost every division of the District and plays a role in most projects.
Because of this proliferation of GIS, there exists a growing need for a greater emphasis on the implementation and management of GIS. Because of the relative newness of this technology, organizations are just now starting to understand the potential uses of GIS as an information management tool, with emphasis on information management.
Conceptionally, technology changes our lives in two ways. First, it changes how we perform our job; and second, it changes what tasks are now possible. To provide an example - typing a letter - whether typing a letter on a manual typewriter, an electric typewriter, or a word processor, typing a letter remains the same task. Where technology, GIS technology in particular, holds the greatest benefit, is in allowing us to do new and different tasks not possible in the past. The use of technology to reengineer our work processes emerges as one of the most powerful and beneficial aspects of technology.
The long range vision we have for GIS at the District is to use GIS as a tool to manage data and integrate technology. Eventually, the goal is to make desk-top GIS available to all the staff who need access to District data. Developments such as the Spatial Database Engine (SDE) from ESRI, will allow real time GIS access to scientists and administrators alike. Ideally, staff can chose an area of interest, whether spatially, or logically, through a series of reselects, and graphically display the results of their query. Staff can then link to any of the data available about that event, whether that data resides in database tables, an image document, a photo, or a video, to mention a few types of media already accessible to a GIS.
Because so much information is spatially referenced, GIS stands out as a prime candidate for the purpose of tying together various technologies. For example, approximately 80 percent of all information is referenced spatially; also, it is estimated that 80 percent of an organization's information is located within an organization's documents. These factors would suggest that document imaging and GIS make for a powerful duo.
To Resource Management staff, this technology could mean review staff in charge of evaluating applications for permitting, can combine their personal knowledge with related data within a GIS. Staff can more easily identify areas of potential water quality concerns, contamination zones, and evaluate applications based on the region as a whole, by easily accessing the information about surrounding existing permits and other proposed permits in a holistic manner rather than case by case.
GIS technology can improve work processes - from the data entry level and the way we manage databases, to the level of sophistication of the analyses. Currently, GIS is used for analyzing and displaying data often entered into and stored in other formats. In the case of many applications, the spatial and descriptive data could be entered straight into the GIS, eliminating redundant data and repetitive transferring of data and creation of GIS coverages project by project.
Resource Management possesses tremendous potential for an effective GIS program. Using GIS as a tool will greatly enhance the management of the large amount of data obtained and maintained by Resource Management; this function is essential considering this data is used by the District in many of its scientific and policy making processes.
In 1995, in order to achieve a highly functional, integrated GIS program, staff identified seven objectives for development over the course of the next twelve to twenty-four months, in order to establish GIS as a major component within Resource Management. These seven objectives are:
At first the assumed solution to handle this situation was through computer automation. While computer automation can successfully absorb some of the daily operating increases, automation simply does the same old procedures, with the net result being hopefully faster more accurate results, but neither are necessarily true. The strength of the technology, in its application in the department, is enabling staff to change daily operating procedures entirely, making them more efficient and accurate.
This objective proved to be one of the greatest challenges - finding ways to free up employee's time, in order to move each employee's knowledge and work responsibilities to the next level.
With GIS technology continually changing, the potential exists to fall behind technological changes without continuous advancement in learning. Educational classes in ARC/INFO have been one of the keys to advance staff in their GIS understanding and capabilities. Since April 1995, staff has received several ESRI GIS training classes. This training has already paid dividends allowing staff to undertake projects which earlier would have been beyond their capabilities. This year, staff is scheduled to receive even more training.
Creating and maintaining digital databases could be approached in stages or parts. In order to create digital databases consistent with the current level and condition of permitting, the District let and completed a contract for digitizing the CUP boundaries. The second phase in creating the GIS databases, as they pertain to Resource Management, concerns the contract to digitize the MSSW boundaries. This data layer is scheduled to be completed in October of 1996.
In many respects, keeping data current is by far a more difficult and critical responsibility than actually automating the CUP and MSSW databases. Failure to keep the data up-to-date and accurate for even a short period of time impacts the validity and usefulness of the entire database. These two data layers will form the basis for many District functions and projects including ground water modeling, permitting, protection of drinking water supply, compliance, engineering, and wetland mitigation.
Undoubtedly as the system progresses there will be a need for secondary databases to also be established. Examples of these auxiliary databases are: storm water permits, contamination zones, and conservation easements.
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