Show us the Stimulus

Government is under pressure to show where stimulus dollars are being spent. A new report rates state websites on how well they show the distribution of funds within their borders. Maps play a critical part in this.

Good Jobs First, a non-profit research center based in Washington, DC, has just published Show Us the Stimulus (Again), an update of a similar report last July. It shows great improvements in the states’ ability to document where the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) dollars are being spent. Some $200 billion dollars are flowing through the states.

The report ranks the states on their ability to show where the money is going. Scores range from 5-87 on a 100 point scale. GIS and mapping contribute greatly to the ability of states to score well in this review. Maryland is rated #1. Three of the seven rating criteria are based on geography:

• Map the distribution of funding at the county level or equivalent.
• Compare that distribution with patterns of economic distress.
• Map individual projects

The Good Jobs First website includes the report, appendices rating the individual state efforts, and links to the state websites. See Show Us the Stimulus: An Evaluation of State Government Recovery Act Websites

Broadband Mapping Funding Available

The US Department of Commerce has released a Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) (PDF) for a State Broadband Data and Development Grant Program. The Notice is published in the Federal Register. There is also a Fact Sheet (PDF).

The media announcement, from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), explains that the funds are intended to support the collection of state-level broadband data, "as well as state-wide broadband mapping and planning."

The Program will provide approximately $240 million in grants to assist states or their designees to develop state-specific data on the deployment levels and adoption rates of broadband services. These data, including publicly available state-wide broadband maps, will also be used to develop the comprehensive, interactive national broadband map that NTIA is required by the Recovery Act to create and make publicly available by February 17, 2011.

This is a grant opportunity that has been expected for some time. Most states have already established teams working on possible approaches to broadband mapping. Broadband mapping is a part of the "Technology for the 21st Century" section of the NSGIC 2008-2009 Advocacy Agenda (PDF). And broadband mapping has been the subject of presentations and discussions at the most recent NSGIC Annual (September 2008) and Midyear (February 2009) conferences.

The program allows only one grant application per state. State-level grants will range from $1.9 million to $3.9 million. Applications are to be accepted via grants.gov between July 14 and August 14, 2009.

National IT Dialogue Follow-Up #1

I got a very nice e-mail just now from Earl Devaney and Ed DeSeve, who headed up the recent Recovery Dialogue on IT Solutions, thanking me for my comments during the dialogue last week. I had commented on the two ideas submitted by NSGIC: enhancing recovery web sites with imagery and thoughts on a nationally consistent approach to collecting geospatial location information.

The "thank you" e-mail noted that there were over 500 ideas suggested, with more than 1,300 comments from among the over 23,000 unique visitors.

With your help, the Recovery Dialogue made history by providing government with a new, proven mechanism for gathering input from individuals and stakeholders. This initiative set out to allow the public an opportunity to submit, debate, and vote on the best ideas for providing the public transparent access to recovery information. We are now compiling the ideas, tools, and approaches from the Dialogue and, this week, the National Academy of Public Administration will present the ideas from the dialogue to the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board to consider during the evaluation phase for building out Recovery.gov.

Needless to say, NSGIC will keep an eye on this process. We have two primary interests:

• Making sure that geospatial data and tools are used, and used well; and
  
• Trying to learn from this Dialogue ways in which we ourselves can do better job of communicating among the states and with our own constituents.
  

These are interesting times that we live in.

A Few Words From the NSGIC President: April Showers Bring May Flowers Showers

The following is the seventh in a series of monthly guest-posts from 2008-2009 NSGIC President Learon Dalby, of Arkansas.

It's been a busy April for NSGIC, and we don't see any signs of a slow-down in May. The Board and committee leadership have been active on many fronts. Let me give you a sense of what's been going on. I know I can't do real justice to any of these, but here's what's been happening.

The NSDI White Paper
The NSDI white paper (PDF) is complete and has been approved by the NSGIC Board. This paper, based on many discussions among NSGIC membership, presents our thoughts on how best to create the National Spatial Data Infrastructure that we all seek to achieve. If I have to boil it down to one thought, it is this: The NSDI will be created as a collection of inter-related SSDIs - State Spatial Data Infrastructures.

Broadband
NSGIC leadership provided comments to the Federal Communications Commission on ways to make broadband mapping more effective as the nation works to close the digital divide. Broadband enhancement is a big and complicated job, but it will depend on accurate mapping of where the broadband infrastructure already exists. And that's something we know how to do.

The National IT Dialogue
NSGIC, as an organization, submitted two ideas to the National IT Dialogue. And many NSGIC members have been active in this on-line discussion which was set up to try to find ways to make recovery and Government Transparency web sites more useful.

We suggested ways to enhance recovery web sites with imagery; a funded Imagery for the Nation (IFTN) program would certainly make this easier.

We also offered thoughts on a nationally consistent approach to collecting geospatial location information on where recovery funds are spent. You'd think that that would be an easy thing to do. But if we want to do it right on a nation-wide basis, we all need to agree on a simple, logical approach.

ARRA Comments
We submitted comments on May 1, 2009, on OMB Section 1512 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, Public Law 111-5. Again, our focus was on a consistent approach to collecting geospatial location information.

FLAIR Act Support
The NSGIC Board passed a motion supporting HR1520 (The FLAIR Act) at its April meeting. This is legislation that calls for the federal government to "improve federal land management, resource conservation, environmental protection, and use of Federal real property, by requiring the Secretary of the Interior to develop a multipurpose cadastre of Federal real property and identifying inaccurate, duplicate, and out-of-date Federal land inventories, and for other purposes."

NSGIC continues to respond to federal requests for comments as best it can. To be most effective, we need the whole of the state GIS coordination community to present a united message and to speak, at times, with many voices in unison. If we do that, we can share the load of speaking to the federal government. If we present a consistent message, we can amplify our message and be most effective.

The NSGIC leadership also needs to hear from individual states as we formulate NSGIC positions. The "State Caucus" is no longer just a part of the mid-year and annual conferences. We now have a "continual caucus" that meets on-line and by conference call. Please don't be a stranger; be a voice in our discussions and in our chorus.

Since We Said We Should, We Did

NSGIC President Learon Dalby has submitted a pair of related suggestions to the National IT Dialogue that we wrote about yesterday. Since good suggestions regarding the value of GIS tools for data visualization are already under discussion, Mr. Dalby has offered two suggestions on ways to make the best use of those tools for tracking stimulus funding:

• Location Schema - Enables Data Analysis and Visualization -- If we're going to track where stimulus funds are spent, let us do it right.
  
• Use Annual Imagery to Track Success (IFTN) -- We can help the people see exactly where and how their money has been spent.

A few words to the wise... There are many voices in this IT Dialogue. The servers are showing the strain; getting from idea to idea can be slow. But it is worth the wait to make your voice heard in an important discussion.

The first thing you should do is register and log in so that you can comment, and vote, on these ideas. Don't wait until after you have scanned the ideas; register now and join the dialogue.

They've Asked, We Should Respond

The Obama Administration has asked for community input, in what they are calling "The National Dialogue, on how to best use Information Technology to keep the public fully informed of how the recovery funding is spent.

Many in the geospatial community have added their ideas to this discussion -- The National Dialogue -- with a primary focus on making sure that we make the best use of appropriate geospatial technologies.

As of this writing, data analysis and visualization and mapping are among the most active topics in the discussion. There are "mapping" suggestions from ESRI (Add Mapping and Geographic Analysis to Recovery.gov), Scott Horvath (Map of Ongoing Recovery Projects), and Grant Thornton (Optimize Transparency and Accountability Using Location).

It is incumbent on the NSGIC membership, as leaders in the geospatial communities in each state, to add our voices to the discussion.

And, for tracking purposes, the National Dialogue is on Twitter at @natldialogue, and there is a "Recovery Dialogue: IT Solutions" Facebook group as well.

They have asked for our input. Let us not let them down.