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ICIS Newsletter
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What's New at ICIS
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About ICIS | |
ICIS (Integrated Cadastral Information Society) is a non profit organization dedicated to the "collaborative sharing and integration of spatial data for the economic and social benefit of British Columbia."
Members of ICIS include Provincial Government Ministries, Crown Corporations, Local and Regional Governments, First Nations, and major Utility companies in BC.
Feedback about this newsletter is welcome. Please email Erin Beatson, Administrative Coordinator. | |
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INSPIRATION AT MISA 2010
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By Barry Logan, Executive Director
ICIS enjoys and benefits from supporting other organizations that represent our collective members in other ways. The annual MISA conference is always on our agenda and there is an expectation that we will accomplish our goals of networking with all participants, demonstrating ICIS products and updating our members on ICIS initiatives through speaking sessions and conversations. Beyond that, everything else that we gain is a bonus.
This year's MISA 2010 West Vernon attendance went far beyond the expected for me. In particular, I experienced an epiphany of sorts thanks to Michael "Pinball" Clemons who provided one of the keynotes.
It certainly helped peak my interest on hearing him as I have followed CFL ball for years and I am very aware of his football skills and earned accolades. I was not aware, however, of "Pinball" the motivational speaker.
He was nothing "short" of being great in this capacity. I found his information to be profound, simple to comprehend, easy to relate to, and very entertaining. This was not just another motivational speech. Rather, "Pinball" delivered a heartfelt message communicating a course of action that is valuable in both personal and business life. It was very apparent that "Pinball" derived his words from his life experiences earning him continued great success.
ICIS bases its success on collaboration and trust. This does not come easy, but is earned and facilitated by effective and meaningful communication. It can be frustrating if the communication does not facilitate the intent and misunderstanding or failure to excite results. According to "Pinball," this poor result should be accepted as MY FAULT, not that of the listener. In order to create the intended acceptance, it is important for the initiator to foster LOVE leading to COMMITTMENT and finally to MARRIAGE. If all of this is accomplished then we end up at the SWEET SPOT for all involved. If you were at the MISA 2010 conference, all of these bold/capitalized/italicized words should bring a smile to your face, a vision of an impassioned "Pinball" delivering the message and meaning for each individual to absorb and utilize.
For me, in my role at ICIS, these words provide clear directives to assist in creating the excitement and buy in for BCSpatial and AddressBC. These two major ICIS projects are our collective SWEET SPOT!
During a conversation with Wayne Ikesaka, Co-Chair, MISA West 2010 Fall Conference (Wayne is the Manager of Information Services for the City of Vernon), I thanked and commended him and his team for their choice. The content provided a different and important message in a very entertaining and meaningful way. Wayne, Michael "Pinball" Clemons keynote was a home run (or more appropriately, a touchdown!).
For more on Michael "Pinball" Clemons, check out his foundation website: http://www.mpcf.ca/aboutus.shtml
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THE POWER OF COLLABORATION
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By Ken Rigler, Membership Coordinator
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The founding members of ICIS should be proud when they realize the power of their creation. ICIS continues to evolve into an organization that is observed with AWE by groups in other areas trying to achieve similar results.
ICIS staff and members dealing with organizations outside of BC are often asked "How did you accomplish this? We've been trying for years and haven't been able to move forward." "When are you going to move into other provinces or the US?"
BC Spatial and AddressBC are perfect examples of our members working together to accomplish what has, up until now, been an insurmountable task. Generally, lack of funds, staff resources, commitment, and focused dedication have made projects like these too daunting a task for any one group to tackle alone.
ICIS members working together to deliver standardized data results in an integrated cadastre and a comprehensive address system for the province. This in itself makes ICIS a very unique success story.
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ADDRESSBC
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By Ann Archibald, Program Coordinator
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As all parents know there is the due date and then there's the delivery date. So with much anticipation the AddressBC database and application are in the process of being delivered and confirmed on ICIS' test environment for a final 'flight' check and sign-off of the Esri deliverable. The AddressBC team will then have an opportunity to get familiar with the application and move it into our Production environment so that our members can begin using the system and seeing the benefits of these new address management tools.
While the application is being put through its paces in the ICIS environment, the AddressBC team is also working to develop training modules for our users. While the application is extremely user-friendly for those used to web interface mapping products some of the features will be more intuitive for those familiar with GIS environments and therefore a quick and easy tutorial can provide the necessary kick-start to the broadest range of users. These tutorials will be posted and available on the ICIS website as we move into Production.
Another aspect of AddressBC that needs to be 'addressed' is how users will integrate their own address information within the AddressBC data model. To help answer these questions, ICIS will need to call on our addressing experts, our local government members, to join and participate in an AddressBC working group to create clear attribute descriptions and use-case examples as a guide for adoption of AddressBC.
If you are interested in participating in the AddressBC working group or would like more information, please contact Ann Archibald, Program Coordinator.
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CIVICSPATIAL AND BCSPATIAL DELIVER
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By Ann Archibald, Program Coordinator
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While ICIS' BCSpatial team has been out visiting all the local governments in the Capital region with tools to make data sharing even easier, the CivicSpatial Grant Program has been there along the way to help make it happen.
As part of the BCSpatial Pilot Project in the Capital Regional District, local governments have the opportunity to receive funding support through the CivicSpatial Grant Program to offset any internal costs of implementing BC Spatial's new automated data delivery tools. Central Saanich, Colwood, Highlands, Metchosin, North Saanich, Oak Bay, Saanich, Sidney, Sooke and Victoria have all received grant funding of $1,500 to help implement these new automated tools.
ICIS is also pleased to be able to continue to support projects in other areas by awarding $6,200 to East Kootenay Regional District and $1,000 to Canal Flats. Both projects will establish survey control and increase the accuracy of the cadastre in the East Kootenay region.
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ROLLING OUT THE CRD MODEL-OF-SUCCESS | |
By Paul van Nieuwkuyk, BCSpatial Project Coordinator |
ICIS' BCSpatial project has wrapped up pilot activities in the Capital Regional District and is planning for further program expansion and rollout. Highlighted successes from the CRD pilot include automated data extraction, delivery and presentation from more than a dozen providers in the region, collaborative parcel fabric contributions from both municipal and provincial sources, and automated data quality analysis and reporting. Users of the cadastre can now access a seamless and consistently attributed regional fabric that is current to within 7 days from each contributing provider.
As a direct result of the focused work to ensure the timeliness and standardization of the cadastre, Terasen Gas has initiated a comprehensive plan to improve the spatial alignment of its utility infrastructure with the parcel base, starting in the Capital Region. Terasen's commitment to such data improvement is founded on timely access to the best available parcel information and provides a powerful incentive to parcel data providers to deliver a standardized product on a regular basis.
Ken Johansson, Senior GIS Administrator for the Capital Regional District, believes that several factors converged to make the pilot program a success. "IT and GIS professionals in the CRD have a long history of collaboration and data sharing that has motivated us to become involved with the project from the start. Along the way, the trend towards greater openness of data in the public sphere, the low-impact requirements of the program, and the promise of better data from ICIS' Utility members made it very compelling for us to roll up our sleeves. Initial results are promising and we are looking forward to working with ICIS to ensure a data quality feedback loop is put in place to continually improve the quality of data. We will have better data locally, we've learned about some of its shortcomings that we can continue to work on together, and we've got a solid foundation for collaboratively building other cross-jurisdictional layers."
ICIS is actively planning for a broader rollout of the program. In presentations at MISA West 2010 and at ICIS 3rd Quarter Board Planning Session, a variety of options for taking the program out to the rest of the province were discussed and are forming the basis of a comprehensive plan. A discussion of some of the top-rated alternatives can be found on the BCSpatial blog.
Other BCSpatial initiatives under consideration for 2011 which support the emphasis on parcel mapping include an expanded data management focus to include point based civic addressing and improved methods of accessing the ICIS geodatabase. Coinciding with the pending production release of AddressBC, BCSpatial will consider facilitating the delivery of municipally-maintained address datasets to the AddressBC specification. In addition, ICIS is working with BC Assessment to prototype web service-based data distribution techniques that will provide its members with alternatives to the current browse, query and download service, with the objective of sharing the best available parcel and address data with ICIS members as quickly and efficiently as possible.
For program inquiries, please contact the Project Coordinator directly and check out the blog for periodic updates.
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A FRESH LOOK FOR ICIS
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By Erin Beatson, Administration Coordinator
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Members have spoken and ICIS has listened.
ICIS is pleased to announce the launch of its new and improved blogs. They are unique, innovative, interactive, open, and collaborative, designed to generate good online discussions and facilitate intelligent conversations. Your input and feedback is valuable to us, so join the conversation.
ICIS is now tweeting with Twitter to provide followers quick and timely information, highlight news, announce participation at events, and share tidbits that are interesting to its membership community.
To access the ICIS blogs and the Twitter, visit the ICIS website home page.
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ICIS EXPANDS ITS MEMBERSHIP SERVICES
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By Erin Beatson, Administration Coordinator |
ICIS has now expanded its membership services to include the distribution of certain communications on behalf of its members.
The stipulation is that these communications distributed through ICIS must be aligned with an ICIS initiative or supportive of the vision and strategic directives of the Society.
Through this service, ICIS not only wishes to provide additional support to its members, it also hopes to encourage engagement, involvement, and collaboration within its membership community.
If your organization has an important message to communicate, please contact Erin Beatson, Administration Coordinator.
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Visiting Victoria? Come visit us at the ICIS Office
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Suite 16
1537 Hillside Ave
Victoria, BC V8T 4Y2
250.381.9295 1.866.403.0095
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