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Special Joint Meeting: MetroGIS Coordinating Committee and Policy Advisory Team
1. CALL TO ORDER
Chairperson Henry called the meeting to order at 1:05 p.m. It was held at the Minnesota State Planning offices
in the Centennial Office Building, near the Capitol in St. Paul.
Members Present: Academics: Will Craig (CURA); Cities: Brad Henry (AMM - Minneapolis); Counties: Ed Shukle
(Anoka), Dave Drealan (Carver); Gary Caswell for Patrick O'Connor (Hennepin), David Claypool (Ramsey), Jim Hentges
(Scott), and Virginia Erdahl (Washington); Federal: Ron Wencl (USGS); GIS Consultants: Larry Charboneau (The Lawrence
Group); Metropolitan: Eli Cooper and Rick Gelbmann (Metropolitan Council); Non-Profits: David Piggott (Metro East
Economic Development Partnership); Schools: Dick Carlstrom (TIES); State: David Arbeit (LMIC) and Dave Gorg (MnDOT),
Utilities: Alan Srock (NSP), and Watershed Districts: Cliff Aichinger (Ramsey-Washington-Metro Watershed District.
Members Absent: Business Geographics: Tim Nuteson (Dayton Hudson Corporation, Cities: Dennis Welsch (AMM -
City of Roseville), Counties: Gary Stevenson (Dakota); State: Les Maki (DNR).
Support Staff: Randall Johnson and Theresa Foster
Visitors: Trudy Richter, Richter and Richardson (Business Planning Consultant Team), Steve Lehr (CB Richard
Ellis), John Connolly, Co-Chair Technical Advisory Team
2. ACCEPT AGENDA
The agenda was accepted as proposed.
3. ACCEPT MEETING SUMMARY
- Wencl moved and Gorg seconded to approve the minutes for the Coordinating Committee’s December 16,
1999 meeting, as submitted, except for the spelling of the names of one of the visitors. Motion passed
unanimously.
- Claypool moved and Cooper seconded to approve the minutes for Policy Advisory Team’s March 20, 2000
meeting, as submitted. Motion passed unanimously.
4. ACTION AND DISCUSSION ITEMS
4a. MetroGIS Business Plan
Randall Johnson explained that the Business Planning Team is seeking feedback from the Committee regarding the
presentation developed for the April 26th Policy Board meeting as well as endorsement from the Committee of the
recommendations set forth in the Plan. Trudy Richter of the Business Planning Consultant Team presented the slides
developed to share the highlights of the Plan with the Policy Board.
Lengthy discussion ensued about three general topics.
- Members raised concerns about what they believed to be a conservative interpretation by the Council’s
legal staff of the possible inability to pass along to the private sector costs associated with assembly and
distribution of regional data.
- The Plan does not clearly state the role of the private sector in assisting with the support of
MetroGIS.
- The objectives the regional parcel dataset pilot project are not clearly stated in the Plan, in
particular, relative to private sector access to regional data.
Private sector members stated they are uncomfortable with participating in the pilot project unless there is a
reasonable chance the parcel data will be made available to private sector interests at a reasonable cost following the
pilot project. Members acknowledged the need to act on the Policy Board’s direction to engage the private sector,
the private sector’s desire to assist with the support of MetroGIS, the need for the counties to agree on a
reasonable fee for private sector access to parcel data, and the need to address the legal concerns raised by counsel.
Members concurred that even if MetroGIS cannot impose a fee to the private sector to provide data distribution services
that the counties can under current law and that the counties can also contract with the Council on behalf of MetroGIS
for costs associated with data classified as having "commercial value" to provide such services. There was general
agreement that with some creativity each of the stated objectives could be accomplished.
Members generally agreed that the presentation should be modified to provide a clear transition from the
listing of expectations of all participants to the work plan through 2003 and to make clear about the action sought
from the Board. Members also suggested that the reasons for the regional parcel data pilot project and what we expect
to learn from it should be more clearly stated both in the Plan and in the presentation. Staff and the county
representatives to the Committee were also encouraged to speak with the Policy Board members from each county prior the
Board meeting to explain the reason for redirecting the annual $75,000 currently dedicated to supplemental data
maintenance payments to the counties.
Piggott moved and Aichinger seconded that the Coordinating Committee recommend that the Policy Board approve
the proposed MetroGIS Business Plan, dated April 5, 2000, with additional instruction to staff to include the private
sector in the financing of the MetroGIS services and a decision how to do so prior to the end of the pilot project.
Motion carried, 16 ayes, 1 nay (Caswell). Caswell voted in opposition because he believes the private sector policy is
beyond the scope of the Business Plan.
Ms. Richter suggested that an attorney versed in the Minnesota’s Data Practices Statutes should attend
the April 26th Policy Board meeting.
4b. Update – Regional Parcel Dataset Pilot Project
Staff summarized progress made on each of the tasks that have been identified to achieve the objectives of the
Regional Parcel Data Pilot Project. It was noted that MetroGIS staff would prefer if a county official would take over
the preparation of the "certification of destruction" document because the counties own the data in question and the
need for completion of the document by mid-May to remain on schedule. No volunteers were identified at the meeting.
Staff also explained that a document to be executed by each of the counties to authorize the Metropolitan Council to
distribute the regional parcel dataset is in the works and it along with a draft license should be available for county
review and comment the week of April 17th.
4c. Update -- MCD/County Jurisdictional Boundaries – Private Sector Access
Staff explained that the county representatives who attend the March 20th Policy Advisory Team had concurred
with a staff recommendation to freely distribute the regional MCD/County Jurisdictional Boundary dataset to the private
sector. He also mentioned that each of the three counties that contributed and Mn/DOT that contributed primary data
have been requested to submit a letter or resolution to the Council to authorize distribution to the private sector.
Srock stated that private sector access to an up-to-date region MCD/County jurisdictional dataset would be a
significant benefit to their need to accurately report the location of their immense number of facilities/assets for
tax purposes and, consequently, he would be willing to pay a subscription fee to access this data if current. He stated
that NSP’s use alone, as the state’s largest taxpayer, would benefit the counties.
Srock’s statement that he would be willing to pay a fee led to a discussion about whether this dataset
qualified for "cost recovery" as a dataset with commercial value. Staff commented that according to legal counsel this
dataset does not meet the "significant public investment test" and therefore does not qualify for "cost recovery".
Others believe that if the private sector is offering to pay a fair fee for the data to avoid larger internal costs
that MetroGIS should find a way to allow the private sector to help finance the services of MetroGIS.
Notwithstanding this philosophical discussion, the group concluded that the counties should continue on the
course to authorize the Council to freely distribute the MCD/County Jurisdictional Boundary dataset to the private
sector, in addition to the public sector. It was agreed that once several regional datasets are available that service
fee could be considered to provide access to packages of datasets and associated attributes compensate for the added
value of the regional dataset over the costs associated with accessing the data directly from the primary sources and
internalizing the costs of assembly into a multiple county dataset.
4d. April 26th Policy Board Agenda
It was agreed that it is premature to ask the Board to take action on classification of MCD/County
Jurisdictional Boundary data as "public domain" and, consequently, that this item should be removed from the April 26th
agenda.
5. INFORMATION SHARING
Chairperson Henry and member Charboneau shared that the panel presentation they participated in about MetroGIS
at the National GIS-T conference in Minneapolis March 27-29 was very well received. Many questions were asked about how
organizations have been brought together in the Metro Area to collaborate on GIS projects and to share data. They both
stated that MetroGIS has a lot to proud of and that from the comments received the GIS wide spread collaboration being
experienced in the Twin Cities appears to far ahead of most areas in the country.
There was no discussion of he other items presented in the staff report.
6. NEXT MEETING
a) Policy Advisory Team - May 25, 2000, if needed
b) Coordinating Committee - the previously scheduled meeting for April 27th was cancelled and the June 29th
meeting was rescheduled to June 22nd.
7. ADJOURN
The meeting adjourned at 3:15 p.m.
Prepared by Randall L. Johnson, AICP, MetroGIS Staff Coordinator
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