Dissolved Teams > Data Content Advisory Team

May 16, 1996 Minutes

The meeting began at 9:30 AM as part of the MetroGIS Phase II Kick Off Forum held at the Kelly Inn in St. Paul.

Members present: Kent Treichel, Rick Person, John Connelly, Marcel Jouseau, Tim Zimmerman, Mike Wood, Robert D. Nelson, Judie Erickson, Roger Carlson, Mark Tente, Dale Nikkola, Jane Harper, Kathy Johnson, Michael Munson, Ron Wirtz, Rebbecca Blue, Will Craig.

Members absent: Tom Eiber, Don Yeager, Joe Ryan, Maria D'Andrea, David Claypool

Support Staff: David Vessel

1. Team Purpose and Organization

The team was introduced to the purpose statement assigned by the Coordinating Committee. This purpose is to identify the datasets and their characteristics which provide the greatest utility for the Metro Area GIS data user community.

Discussion then turned to the best strategy for accomplishing this goal. The team discussed organizing members into focus groups according to their job description. Each focus group will be responsible for identifying regionally significant datasets used among their work areas. The focus group concept was unanimously approved by the team.

2. Focus Group Themes

The traditional approach to data has been to organize around a thematic layer such as parcels, soils, or road centerlines. This method of data organization is particularly effective when designing a data collection methodology; however, the data theme approach is premature for the MetroGIS Data Content Team since it assumes that certain data layers are "core" or "regional significant". The method this team is advocating is a data use/need methodology in which professionals are asked about their data needs. Using this method, groups of users with common work topics are organized into groups. Each group assembles a list of data which they use/need and ranks this list of data according to its importance. The ranked list from all of the groups are then compiled to identify similarities. Ideally, the similarities represent the "CORE" datasets.

Since designation of themes for the focus groups is critical to the success of the team, a good deal of discussion was spent on this issue. It was agreed that everyone on the team must have a place among the focus groups. It is also important to have as many different types of stakeholders represented as possible. Seven groups were initially suggest. The discussion ended with 6 groups as follows: a) Community and Economic Development/ Planning/ Growth Management/ Demographics/ Housing/ Employment/ Research; b) Property Taxation/ Elections; c) Public Works/ Parks and Recreation/ Utilities/ Transportation/ Communications; d) Natural Resources/ Environmental Protection; e) Public Safety/ Judicial; f) Human, Social, and Educational Service/ Public Health (code enforcement; licensing, nursing). There was no vote or consensus to finalize the Focus Group themes. Further discussion may take place in the coming meeting.

3. Preliminary Focus Groups Volunteers

In an effort to gauge interest and identify which groups needed more participation, each attending member was asked to volunteer for one or more of the six topical groups. The results are tallied below.

1. Community and Economic Development/ Planning/ Growth Management/ Demographics/ Housing/ Employment/ Research
   1. Ron Wirtz, Citizens' League
   2. Jane Harper, Washington County
   3. Michael Munson, Metropolitan Council
   4. Kathy Johnson, Metropolitan Council
   5. Will Craig, University of MN, CURA
   6. Tim Zimmerman, Hennipen County Planning Dept.
   7. Kent Treichel, Wilder Foundation
   8. Rebecca Blue, SEH, Inc.
   9. Judie Erickson, City of St. Louis Park
2. Property Taxation/ Elections
   1. Roger Carlson, City of Minneapolis
   2. John Connelly, St. Paul and Ramsey County Charter Commissions
3. Public Works/ Parks/ Utilities/ Transportation/ Communications
   1. Ron Wirtz, Citizens' League
   2. Mike Wood, Waypoint Technologies
4. Natural Resources/ Environmental Protection
   1. Marcel Jouseau, Metropolitan Council Environmental Services
5. Public Safety/ Judicial
   1. Mark Tente, Lake Johanna Fire Department
   2. John Connelly, St. Paul and Ramsey County Charter Commissions
6. Human/Social/Education Services / Public Health (Code Enforcement, Licensing, Nursing)
   1. Bob Nelson, Richfield Public Schools

4. Questions and Comments

The following questions and comments were received from the meeting. Look for answers at the next team meeting and/or in the premier issue of the MetroGIS newsletter.

• Do we know who has the "Best" GIS in the region and in the nation and could we analyze their data to identify a "core" dataset?
• Will we be given some document or paper describing some base of where regional GIS is currently? Something that will show how far we have come and how far we have to go and the time frames for each of the teams.
• I think the labels for the some of the Topics teams should be Properties (Property), Programs (Human, etc.), Pathways (public works, etc.), Planning (CD), and People (demographics)
• I think the pace of the meeting was too fast. I would really like to reconsider the topic groups again before we progress onto other items.

5. Next Meeting

The next meeting of the Data Content Team will be June 12, 1996 at 1:00 PM in room 156 of the Earle Brown Center.

6. The meeting adjourned at 10:30 AM.

Prepared by David Vessel, GIS Specialist