Minnesota Governor's Council on Geographic Information

Executive Committee Meeting Minutes

Members Attending:

Larry Charboneau (Chair), Lawrence Group
Fred Logman, Minnesota Counties Computer Cooperative
Mark Olsen, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
Glenn Radde, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources
Jay Wittstock, URS/BRW Inc.
David Arbeit, Land Management Information Center

Others:

Chris Cialek, Land Management Information Center
Nicole Beck, Land Management Information Center

Call to order, approval of agenda and last meeting minutes

• Larry Charboneau called the meeting to order at 8:15 a.m.
• Committee members approved the agenda and April 3, 2001 meeting minutes.

Committee Updates

Committee reports focused on end of year activity/reports. Members discussed methods to present committee activity to the full council at the June 13 meeting and decided on oral reports rather than the PowerPoint presentations used last year. Committee chairs should describe the year's initiatives and accomplishments followed by goals proposed for next year's committee activities.

Proposed City/Township ID Code Standards 

Chris Cialek reported that the Standards Committee has been working to finalize a numeric coding standard to identify Minnesota cities, townships and unorganized territories, which would be known as the CTU coding standard. Mark Kotz (Metropolitan Council), Jim Hibbs (State Demographer’s Office) and Cialek are the principal developers of the standard. A draft proposal states that "The purpose of this standard is to provide a single, common coding scheme to describe all cities, townships and unorganized territories in Minnesota. Its primary use is intended when data is being transferred between a state agency and some external customer. Its use will improve the shareability of data resources created by the state of Minnesota and local government by avoiding unnecessary duplication and reducing incompatibilities in the collection, processing and dissemination of data."

Committee members discussed the importance of tracking changes over time. Cialek noted that information could be added to the database when such changes occur. Cialek also noted that all suggestions regarding the standards are welcome and encouraged a thorough review.

Motion: Logman moved to forward the proposed CTU standard to the full council for review. With council approval, the standard would be forwarded to the Information Policy Council for adoption. Radde seconded the motion. Motion passed without dissent.

Discussion of Watershed Districts

Committee members discussed a recent request from council member Tim Ogg to disseminate information to the full council regarding the definition/clarification of watershed districts. Members reviewed Ogg's memo and agreed that the information should be distributed to the full council for review and discussion. Glenn Radde will contact Tim Ogg to further clarify remaining needs / problems that the committee members feel should be included in the items of discussion. The memo will be distributed at the June 13, 2001 full council meeting.

Executive committee members discussed the process for reviewing council applications for FY2002 appointments. The review process will begin June 20, 2001. All current council members will need to update their current application and sign to reapply.

Planning for Annual Report

Members discussed and agreed to keep last year's format for the annual report. A memo including council accomplishments will be distributed with the brochure, which will include an updated accomplishments insert. Nicole will forward a template to committee chairs to format their end of year committee reports. The end of year committee reports will be reformatted for the brochure insert of the annual report.

SWSU Meeting Debriefing   

Committee members discussed the May 9, 2001 full council meeting that was held at Southwest State University in Marshall, MN. Committee members felt that the council's presence was welcomed and members enjoyed the local presentations. However, the members felt that more interactions should occur between the council members and guests. Logman suggested that the agenda be reformatted to allow for local presentations to occur before the council business meeting. This may provide more opportunities for council members to relate local issues with council business. Logman also suggested the following format for outstate meetings:

Presentations

Lunch (with local guests and council members, intermixing between the two groups)

Business Meeting

Members agreed with Logman, and will try to use a format that will allow for more time to be spent with guests/host at outstate meetings. Members also noted that a welcome from the local host would be more appropriate than a tour in some cases. This will be re-evaluated as meeting logistics vary from the different locations.

Logman noted that the metro area has over 50% of GIS related technologies/users and stated that some "outstate" meetings may not need to be outside the metro area. He suggested that the council could keep with a similar format but perhaps include a metro organization. Similar to the January 10, 2001 meeting that was held at the University of Minnesota, Carlson School of Management where the presentations were from other agencies/organizations - Dave Gorg, Control Point Inventory and Dave Claypool, Bureau of Land Management.

Committee Members also discussed various "outstate" meeting locations for FY2002. The following were suggestions that will be forwarded to the Outreach Committee:

• Rochester
• St. Cloud
• Mankato
• Fargo/Moorhead
• Chaska - Weather Service (Metro)

June 13 Meeting Planning

Members discussed the tentative agenda as follows:

Action items

• NSGIC Representation
• State GIS profile - council review

Updates

• Minnesota Planning (Arbeit/Barkley)
• Council Reauthorization
• Annual Report
• FY 2002 Council Appointments

• Council members are to update and sign their current council application

• Legislative reports
• Grant and funding opportunities

End of Year Council Report

• Accomplishments
• Future Initiatives
• Annual member survey

Committee FY 2001 activity reports

• Open mike time
• Other Business

Other Business

No other business was discussed.

Next Meeting

June 20^th, 1:00 - 3:00 p.m., Minnesota Planning, Centennial Office Building, room 304.

Adjourn

Meeting adjourned at 10:00 a.m.