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URISA 2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

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Annual Conference & Exposition
October 7-10, 2008 • New Orleans
Spatially Enabling the Enterprise

“This conference was one of the best I have ever attended. Each talk I chose was valuable and exceeded what I expected. The size of the conference was good, big enough to attract great people but small enough to be able to get around.”
– Johanna Eversole, GIS Coordinator, City of Olive Branch, Mississippi

Download the Preliminary Program


Highlights
New This Year!
Invitation
Program Tracks
Preliminary Conference Schedule
Registration & General Information

Highlights

Twelve full-day URISA Certified Workshops from Building Quality Spatial Data to GIS Program Management

With an attendance capacity of 40, each workshop offers close interaction with the instructors.

Real world applications and scenarios

Our educational sessions will help you define ways to streamline processes, manage resources and do more with less.

Local, regional and global participation

Like our attendees, our presenters are current and future GIS leaders from around the world who represent all levels of government, private sector and academia. By attending URISA 2008 you will gain valuable insight from these different perspectives.

Interactive issues discussions

Sessions are more than just lectures. Interactive dialogue with instructors and fellow attendees help connect your issues with solutions.

Targeted professional development opportunities

Learn about tools and strategies to improve the way you do your job and advance your career.

Networking Activities

URISA’s networking events are an easy and fun way to expand your professional community.

New This Year!

Awards Breakfast - Join us in recognizing the outstanding work of your peers at our first ever Awards Breakfast.

Interactive Problem Solving Track - Hot topics facing the industry today will be presented in a very interactive environment. You and your fellow attendees will work to solve these problems and how to apply them to your organization.

Help Rebuild New Orleans - New Orleans has come a long way since Katrina, but there is still a lot to be done. Join your fellow attendees in a charity activity that helps New Orleans rebuild and leaves you with a good feeling of accomplishment and camaraderie.


An Invitation to URISA’s 2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Why do I want to attend this conference? Why should you?

The GIS industry is evolving and we are now starting to see niche markets. We see conferences devoted to a variety of specialties such as health, utilities, property assessment, and emergency management, in addition to the important vendor-specific conferences. Most of these conferences follow a similar format and provide “standard content” – an overall theme, opening/closing sessions, awards & recognition, papers (presentations), vendors, networking, and social events.
When I only have so much money in my budget for a conference (or professional development as my employer likes to refer to it) how do I decide where to allocate those precious resources of time and money? I look to the URISA Annual Conference & Exposition of course! There is something about URISA that sets this conference apart from others, and that is the reason why you will want to spend your professional development dollars here. I’ll tell you why in a minute. But first I’d like to allocate some time to describe some of the “standard content” that you can experience in New Orleans.

This year’s Conference Committee is passionate, diverse and strong. They spent considerable time organizing, debating and identifying great content that consistently meets our professional standards. While not wishing to settle for the usual “standard content”, the conference program that this committee has put together is of the highest quality.

The theme helps to set the conference’s focus. This year’s Conference Committee believed that it was important to stress how GIS is integrating with major IT systems. Therefore, this year the conference theme is Spatially Enabling the Enterprise. We have brought together a wide variety of applications that highlight how GIS supports critical business applications from almost every conceivable discipline and profession.

After a full day of educational workshops, the Annual Conference & Exposition will begin with an informative Opening Session and Keynote Speaker. We are proud to present David Gisclair of the Louisiana Oil Spill Coordinator’s Office as our Keynote speaker to kick things off. This is followed by two and half days of quality presentations by our industry leaders, presenting what is going on in the GIS world today. The Exposition will allow vendors to show you their latest developments, while providing a venue to meet new people and catch up with old friends and colleagues. This year we have redesigned the Awards and Recognition Ceremony, into a format that allows both audience and recipients a more comfortable atmosphere and pace by way of an Awards Breakfast. The Conference Social Event is a short walk from the Sheraton Hotel at Pat O’s on the River, in the Jax Millhouse, with live entertainment. I encourage you to browse through this online preliminary Conference Program (www.urisa.org) for more details.

So why should you attend this conference? Here are four solid reasons:

  1. To quote Hilary Perkins our President-Elect: “It’s the only [venue] that serves your educational needs as a user and manager of spatial data across the board – from detailed, non-vendor specific technical information, to management applications and big-picture GIS issues.” URISA Workshops are a great example of this. They are high quality tested content.
  2. We cannot stress enough, the networking value of the URISA Annual Conference. It’s designed with many opportunities to meet other professionals. As stated by Kim H. McDonough: “The perfect example of the strength of URISA was at the Conference Social Event. I passed a table where four people were engaged in close conversation. One was from New York City, another from Rutherford County, Tennessee and two from Boise, Idaho! What a great experience! That is the foremost reason I attend URISA.”
  3. The Panels. The Conference integrates Special Panels throughout the conference. These Panels have carefully selected leaders and professionals that share their real-world experience with spatially enabling the enterprise. To hear the industry’s foremost experts discuss and explore a current issue that directly affects you is exciting, surprising, satisfying, and sometimes amusing.
  4. This last great reason for attending this conference is one that I’m personally signing up for. We’re organizing a post-conference charity event to help in efforts to “Rebuild New Orleans,” cleaning up a neighborhood affected by Hurricane Katrina. What a great way to give something back to New Orleans!

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to meeting you at the conference. Please do not hesitate to introduce yourself! I’ll be the guy at the Welcome & Keynote giving you the “standard” Welcoming Address.


Conference Chair – David Dubauskas, Alberta Capital Regional Alliance


Program Tracks

The educational program has been organized into several important program tracks described below. Attendees may choose to concentrate on sessions within one or two tracks, or jump between sessions in multiple tracks. This ‘do-it-yourself’ educational experience allows you to tailor fit your conference experience to your specific needs!

Cross-Jurisdictional Collaboration
Collaboration in one form or another is a fundamental component of every successful GIS implementation. True partnerships, where all partners benefit equally, lead to ongoing successes with every aspect of a program, from data sharing to enterprise application and architecture development to shared services. Participants in this track will learn about collaboration techniques and help define new approaches for developing and managing long-term partnerships.
Cross-Jurisdictional Collaboration Track Team: Milo Robinson, Federal Geographic Data Committee, Reston, Virginia; Danielle Ayan, GISP, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA; Mark Sievers, Sievers & Associates, Altamonte Springs, FL

Management & Professional Development
Spatial information professionals often have unique experience, training, and education credentials that are mostly technical. Yet, your continuing professional advancement will depend on your ability to communicate with decision-makers, the social networks you build, and the ongoing education you receive throughout your career. To become an authority and a leader, both students and specialists alike must develop a wide-ranging set of skills. This track was formed to address a number of issues pertinent to the image and professional development path of the geospatial technologies professional in today’s working world. An essential goal of this track is to provide an interactive forum for URISA to help define the necessary steps and the available resources to develop an insightful geospatial professional - someone capable of functioning at all levels as an indispensable member of a management team.
Management & Professional Development Track Team: Lisa Lubeley, Dudek, GISP, Inc., Encinitas, California; Hilary Perkins, GISP

3D GIS
The integration of GIS and IT tools in business applications continues to grow. Increasingly, businesses depend more heavily on their ability to perform a variety of qualitative and quantitative analytical tasks in real world, three-dimensional contexts. The sessions in this track will highlight new and innovative 3D tools, data, and methods that facilitate automated data mapping, reporting, data capture and validation, modeling, and visualization. Bring your world to your desktop!
3D Track Team: Kathrine Cargo, GISP, Orleans Parish Communications District, New Orleans, LA; Tom Conry, Fairfax County, Fairfax, VA; Alex Hepp, Pictometry International, Rochester, New York; Michael Waltuch, ESRI, New York, NY; Al Little, City of Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Geospatially Enabled Enterprise
Geospatial technologies are now considered mainstream components within the overall enterprise IT framework and are increasingly used for a wide rage of business process automation. Key considerations toward implementing geospatial enterprise solutions will be examined. Integrating technologies such as SOA, open frameworks, web portals and overcoming data ownership issues are all critical components that will be discussed. The importance of enterprise addressing systems and standards are emphasized. Examples of integrating legacy property/tax data, utility field data collection/inspection and adding geospatial representation to document management systems will be presented. See how the development and implementation of a Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) involves collaboration and information synthesis from multiple lines of business within an agency from budgeting and finance to construction project management. Listen to case studies on geospatial enterprise solutions at the municipal and state levels.
Geospatially Enabled Enterprise Track Team: Mike Lovett, GISP, Camp Dresser & McKee Inc., Maitland, Florida; Danielle Ayan, GISP, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia; Twyla McDermott, City of Charlotte, Charlotte, North Carolina.

Emergency Management & Homeland Security
The degree to which communities are (or are not) prepared to respond effectively in the event of a disaster or emergency situation has raised many issues. Natural disasters such as wildfires and flooding, and man-made emergencies such as collapsing infrastructure all require a coordinated, prepared response. Attend this track and hear how GIS technology is incorporated in different phases of emergency response and management. Featured in this track are presentations on GIS in Public Health, methods of data preparation and dissemination, case studies, and lessons learned from past disasters.
Emergency Management and Homeland Security Track Team: Kathrine Cargo, GISP, Orleans Parish Communications District, New Orleans, LA; Tom Conry, Fairfax County, Fairfax, VA; Alex Hepp, Pictometry International, Rochester, NY; Michael Waltuch, ESRI, New York, NY; Al Little, City of Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Public Participation GIS (PPGIS)
As stakeholders from local to international levels increasingly rely on spatial data for collective decision-making, public participation and GIS have become ever more closely linked. This program track highlights new developments in Public Participation GIS for a range of applications including planning, smart-growth, public health, disaster response, and environmental management at a variety of scales.
Public Participation GIS Track Team: Clare Brown, City of Atlanta, Atlanta, Georgia; Wansoo Im, Vertices, New Brunswick, New Jersey; Carl Anderson, Fulton County, Atlanta, Georgia

Data Acquisition & Conversion
A GIS is a collection of hardware, software, and data. Without the data, a geographic information system doesn’t exist. With the lack of data, there are no inputs on which to provide analyses for support of decision-making. Data that is not verified and maintained is as bad as not having data, as the results may not be very useful for making decisions. Data that is unput in a non-structured manner can cost cost you time and money. The Data Acquisition & Conversion Track covers a wide range of topics that will challenge the practitioner in a number of areas such as: standards, data models, verification and maintenance, and metadata, along with more specific data.
Data Acquisition & Conversion Track Team: Randy Fusaro, US Census; Winchester Jordan, Lafayette Parish Assessor’s Office, Lafayette, Louisiana.

Natural Resources & Environment
The Stewardship of our Environment discusses the interplay of economically sound development, resource management, education and research to preserve and maintain our natural resources, using remote sensing and available GIS tools. Natural Resources and Environment Track Team: Ken Sipos, City of Philadelphia, PA; Tobias Wolf, GISP, HDR Inc, San Diego, CA.

Infrastructure
Infrastructure is part of our everyday lives. We all expect good roads, clean drinking water and reliable electricity to light our homes and businesses. It is one of those things that everyone takes for granted. Yet, it is the infrastructure that keeps our lives going. Everything from commerce to sewerage treatment depends on infrastructure. It is the roads, pipes, ditches, and the wires that make it possible for anything to get done. Infrastructure data is as diverse as it is necessary. More and more jurisdictions are using GIS technology as part of their business to manage various components of infrastructure. There are still cases where it is taken for granted and is often neglected as a GIS framework layer. In many cases, infrastructure data exists as memories in someone’s mind or as a stack of plans in a file drawer. These sessions will help to reveal variety methodologies for creating and then effectively utilizing GIS in managing and maintaining infrastructure data.
Infrastructure Track Team: Kim McDonough, GISP, Tennessee Department of Transportation; Karen Stewart, GISP, ESRI Canada, Ltd.; Mohammed Tariq, GISP, Peak Technology Solutions Inc.

Interactive & Problem Solving Track
Part of attending a conference is finding ways to apply solutions to your every day, real-world problems. This track will help you identify ways to implement solutions through group discussion as well as polling panels of industry experts.

What was the one most valuable part of your attendance at the 2007 URISA Annual Conference & Exposition?

“The professional tone and content, not a constant sales pitch.”
Melissa Dabbs, GIS Coordinator, City of Danville, Virginia

“The opportunity to meet and discuss issues/opportunities with the many knowledgeable people in our field was valuable.
Having them all in one place at the same time is a great benefit.”
Rob Lunn, GIS Coordinator, City of Fredericton, New Brunswick

Preliminary Conference Schedule

To view the preliminary conference schedule grid, click here .

Click on each day in the schedule below for detailed information about individual presentations and speaker information.

Monday, October 6, 2008

  • Board of Directors Meeting
  • Chapter Leaders' Forum

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

  • Preconference Workshops
  • First-Time Attendee Networking Meeting
  • Exhibit Hall Installation

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

  • Welcome & Keynote Address
  • Educational Sessions
  • Roundtable Luncheon
  • Exhibit Hall Hours
  • Exhibit Hall Networking Reception

Thursday, October 9, 2008

  • Awards Breakfast
  • Educational Sessions
  • Exhibit Hall Hours
  • Conference Social Event

Friday, October 10, 2008

  • Educational Sessions
  • Closing Plenary Speaker
  • Annual Business Meeting
  • "Rebuild New Orleans" Charity Event

Saturday, October 11, 2008

  • Board of Directors' Meeting

Registration & General Information

Watch for news about a URISA “Rebuild New Orleans” charity event taking place in conjunction with the conference!