GIS Steering Committee

“Where People Count ” MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEMS 1000 Civic Center Drive, Niles, Illinois 60714 Telephone (847) 588-8000 Fax (847) 588-8050 GIS Steering Committee Meeting March 18, 2010 Co-Chairs: Andrew Przybylo – Trustee George Van Geem – Village Manager Persons in attendance: Bob Callero Mayor Steve Cusick MIS Dept. Mousa Nazzal Engineering Dept. Bob Pilat Public Services Bill Shaw MIS Dept. George VanGeem Village Manager Andrew Vitale MIS Dept. Rich Wlodarski Community Development Dept. The meeting was called to order at 8:01 a.m. Agenda Item #1 – Old Business – Project Updates Monument Re-calibration A.Vitale reported that the monument re-calibration project has been going on for about a week. M. Nazzal added that AP Surveying Co. has completed gathering GPS coordinates for all monuments to be used as part of this project, and are now traversing all the monuments points. Hopefully, this should be done in two weeks. M. Nazzal passed around a sample formatted data sheet of how this final information will be reported back to the Village. These data sheets will be given to us digitally and in hardcopy. This will change how we report our monuments on the Web. MWRD GPS Data Sharing Agreement A.Vitale heard back from the MWRD regarding our data sharing agreements. The agreements are signed and are all in place. When the MWRD is ready for our data, they will contact A.Vitale and will provide us with their GPS data as well. Unfortunately, it probably won’t be until 2011. M. Nazzal commented that he talked with the consultant who is doing the GPS for MWRD. They are not using FEMA benchmarks; they are using GPS data. A.Vitale added that MWRD does not have their own benchmarks; they use a mix and match of their own, FEMA’s, IDOT’s – whatever they can find along the way. They have no unified reference system. Agenda Item #2 – Departmental Projects Sewer & Water Mapping Update A.Vitale reported that he received all the comments back from the Public Works on water, and he made those part of the record. He and M. Nazzal reviewed them and returned them to Public Works with questions regarding missed points. There are approximately one to two more weeks of field work remaining. It was clarified that this is the map that will be used for the water supply system. Inclusion of Planimetric Data A.Vitale has been working on including the planimetric data into our production data. The biggest key to this has been the building layer, because it is very closely tied to our address model and our parcel data model. There are a few steps remaining, but everything should be ready to go after that – road edges, sidewalks, parking areas, etc. They will be made part of our regular mapping updates. He will not put them on Atlas until they are in our production data, and they will be visible very soon after that. R. Wlodarski asked if the Community Development Department should submit changes and updates to buildings to A. Vitale. A. Vitale responded yes, if these changes are to be reflected on Atlas. He will work with Community Development to come up with a process of how to submit such changes to him. Maintenance Management System (MMS) B. Shaw and S. Cusick are working on the design of one of the main drive components of the MMS and all our systems. It is important to make sure that the foundation that everything will be built on is solid and accounts for future needs. They are making progress and are in good shape. B. Pilat asked if MMS will be able to track MFT (Motor Fuel Tax) eligible expenses. This request should be noted, as it does effect the design work that B. Shaw and S. Cusick are engaged in. *** A.Vitale commented that because we have new air photos, updated information (i.e., our radio sites), and the ability to print easily, he will replace the conference table maps in the 2nd floor main conference room 218 and in the 1st floor conference room, as well as at the Police Department. It was noted that we must keep in mind what kind of map, and with what level of detail, would be most helpful to each area, and tailor-make the maps accordingly. B. Shaw asked B. Pilat to determine if he wants the large ortho at Public Services to be replaced. Mayor Callero asked that we do not discard the old maps. A.Vitale assured that they will be stored. 2  *** A.Vitale said that he has gone over our Atlas pages and has redesigned and will print the water atlas page. He is working on the sewer atlas page, and will have some samples for M. Nazzal in the next couple of weeks. *** Agenda Item #3 – New Business Cook County Data Sharing (Assessment Data) A.Vitale has been trying to get information about the assessment data from the Cook County Assessor’s office. “It has not been a lot of fun.” Mr. Spalla, our contact at the Assessor’s office, has not yet responded to our call. The assessment table is the last table he needs to roll in all of our current/newer Cook County information – new parcels, new ownership, etc. Their planimetric data and air photos have not changed; parcels and owners have changed but cannot be put in place because we do not have the complete information yet. Once we have that, he and S. Cusick can work on rolling in the new parcels, etc The assessment data is updated every year; major changes are made every three years. A.Vitale gets new information from them every year, and he likes to keep the newer information in place so that he can guarantee that this is the most current information he has access to. A.Vitale will continue to try to contact to Mr. Spalla, as well as the GIS manager’s supervisor regarding how much information of theirs we can share on our website, through the regular channels before asking for “political” help to get results. Atlas Training A.Vitale reported that he and T. Spadoni have been working on putting together a list of employees who are interested in Atlas training. T. Spadoni has heard back from Police Chief Dean Strzelecki, but not from Fire Chief Barry Mueller. Response has been slow; Mayor Callero said to keep after them, and gave permission to make it mandatory for certain levels. B. Shaw noted that the Fire Department employees are involved in training all the time, and are scheduled three months in advance. It is therefore difficult to add an Atlas training class to their already packed schedule. We are hoping they will be able to train on Atlas by the summer. We can also offer additional Atlas training to Public Works employees. M. Nazzal showed Atlas to Sewer Department employees, and they were happy. B. Pilat pointed out that many Public Works employees do not have access to a PC. B. Shaw said that it is not a problem to assign a login to all Public Works employees and provide a couple of shared computers around the campus. Digital Data Submission Policy A.Vitale has been investigating how to incorporate changes made to our water, sewer and building layers by outside contractors or construction projects in order to keep our information up-to-date. He is looking for a way to formalize the process of getting this digital data, via referenced CAD files, from anyone doing work within the Village. If it’s geo-referenced, if it’s on an established layer, it can cut down his workload by at least 75% when it comes to entering 3 new information. The Engineering Department, and possibly Community Development, as well as all outside consultants and contractors, would have to adhere to this. A.Vitale has found a few submission policies that he likes - one in particular from the village of Algonquin. He has known Brian from the village of Algonquin for years, and Brian has had great success with this. A.Vitale needs to learn more about it, and it may require a site visit. He has shared this policy with M. Nazzal and C. Ostman and is hoping for feedback from them soon. He will have more information next month. M. Nazzal noted that the Engineering Department requires this GPS data anytime there is a project for water mains, etc. A. Vitale responded that the information must be geo-referenced to facilitate his work. B.Shaw asked if it is possible/reasonable to ask a contractor to base their GPS points off one of our monuments as a starting point so that all of the xyz data is in the correct geo-referenced position. S. Cusick suggested that we force them to tie off something that we have GPSed. A.Vitale responded that one of the layers that is on this standardized CAD file could be our references, our benchmarks, so if those things are already referenced in this CAD file and they use this as one of their starting points, then all their drawings will also be referenced at the same time. He can include almost anything on these layers, such as our parcel layer and curb lines, on a standardized, geo-referenced CAD layer. We would require them to use our CAD layer. A.Vitale continued that at Algonquin, they have stacks of five or ten CDs with this standardized CAD file. When anyone does any work, he is given one of the CDs to use. Similarly, our contractors would be forced to use the CAD file we approve, with our layering system and our geo-reference system. We can include any information we want – our benchmarks, our parcel lines – whatever we feel we want to share. S. Cusick suggested that we can package all those files as a ZIP file and put them on the website. A. Vitale continued that if we get any project that does not come back with this layering scheme and our CAD file, then we reject it out-of-hand. Mayor Callero commented that when someone comes in and wants something done, they do not want to be delayed by us. This will be a help for them. B. Shaw added that it should help the Community Development review process. R. Wlordarski concurred. A.Vitale noted that while most communities do not have this kind of policy in place, those that do have had good results. These files could be customized with additional layers for larger projects or specific needs, but the initial idea is to provide a general, generic template that anyone could use. We can keep several CDs at the front desk for a standardized - no problem sharing, no permissions issues, no accuracies issues – procedure. B. Shaw suggested a sharing agreement with contractors to ensure that our infrastructure data is not shared inappropriately. The agreement could be one of the files on the CD. M. Nazzal asked how we would enforce it: by policy or by ordinance. The general consensus of the group was to create an ordinance. Our goal, after the system is developed and in place, is to present it to the Board by the end of the year. A.Vitale, with M. Nazzal, will do some preliminary testing on the standard template that he has. He will report back at the next meeting. 4 Posting of GIS Steering Committee Minutes A.Vitale asked the committee to decide if our draft minutes should be posted on the Village website, or wait to post the approved minutes after the next meeting. G. VanGeem suggested that the minutes be emailed to each committee member. Those who were present at that meeting will have one week (5 business days) to accept or reject the minutes. The minutes can only be approved when there is a reply of “accept” from a majority of those who were present at that meeting. Then the minutes can be posted. The committee agreed. The minutes of the February 17, 2010 meeting were approved by consensus. Agenda Item #5 – Schedule the Next Meeting The next meeting will be Thursday, April 22, 2010 at 8:00 a.m. in the 2nd floor main conference room 218. The meeting was adjourned at 8:43 a.m. Steering Committee Members Andrew Przybylo Trustee atp@vniles.com George Van Geem Administration gvg@vniles.com 847-588-8002 Bill Shaw MIS wfs@vniles.com 847-588-8015 Andrew Vitale MIS ajv@vniles.com 847-588-8022 Steve Cusick MIS src@vniles.com 847-588-8018 Moses Nazzal Engineering mhn@vniles.com 847-588-7924 Scott Jochim Public Services snj@vniles.com 847-588-7901 Bob Pilat Public Services rmp@vniles.com 847-588-7926 Chuck Ostman Community Development cfo@vniles.com 847-588-8041 Rich Wlordarski Community Development rjw@vniles.com 847-588-8085 5