GIS Mapping for Regional Economic Development

Geographic information systems (GIS) technology is a planning tool that regional development organizations are using for all areas of economic development planning and program delivery. GIS creates pictures or maps of regions, identifying assets, potential assets and resource needs. According to the 2000 NADO Research Foundation survey, 69 percent of regional development organizations use GIS and GPS.

Utah

The Mountainland Association of Governments (AOG), an Economic Development Administration funded economic development district in northern Utah, is one regional organization for which the use of GIS has improved and expanded planning services.

This map was produced for a community meeting on trails and will be coming back after input on where the community would like trails.

In 1995, like many regional development organizations, Mountainland AOG made a cost-effective decision to acquire GIS equipment and bring GIS operations in-house instead of contracting out. According to Darrell Cook, Mountainland’s Executive Director, “GIS has proven to be a great investment. Because of it, we’ve been able to expand the scope of our planning projects.” Mountainland, also a metropolitan planning organization for transportation, primarily uses GIS data for road and trail development. The transportation data can also be used for other regional planning projects. Mountainland GIS Director Andrew Wooley describes how data overlapping evolves into shared data, “Determining road impact requires knowing the status of endangered species, wetlands, schools, property ownership and many other community elements that might be affected by new roads. This information can then be queried and used.”

The queries become maps with layers showing planners an accurate, detailed picture of the element they need to know about. For example, layered GIS maps help Mountainland planners identify roads that can be used for emergency response routes, according to road usage and conditions. The region has provided environmental assessments required in recreation development, illustrated structural conditions of buildings in order to select community development block grant projects, inventoried land uses to determine business expansion locations, and displayed regional demographics to determine the impact of human services programs.

“Using GIS regionally and sharing data helps state planning. We use their information to support projects, like an Economic GIS Model to improve land use planning, which is now pending at the governor’s planning office,” says Chris Glazier, Utah’s Department of Transportation GIS Supervisor. Cook, like Glazier, also sees new planning opportunities based on GIS, “One dream I have is that GIS will help regional organizations to assist in developing Utah’s first rural transportation planning organization someday.”

According to Jack Dangermond, President of Environmental Systems Research Institute, Inc. (ESRI), a leader in GIS technology, “GIS brings people closer to their worlds and empowers them to define a future that reflects their values, hopes and dreams.” Mountainland’s use of GIS technology, like that of many regional development organizations, is an asset to planning and the communities they serve.

Oklahoma

The South Western Oklahoma Development Authority (SWODA) is an EDA funded district serving eight counties, 46 cities and towns and ten conservation districts. SWODA uses GIS to develop capital improvements plans (CIPs) for local governments, a process that requires an inventory of all local government assets. They realized that the CIP would meet the requirements of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board Statement 34 (GASB 34), Basic Financial Statements for State and Local Governments, issued in 1999. GASB 34 requires, among other things, governments to report all assets, including infrastructure. Many regional development organizations will work with local governments in their districts to undertake the data gathering and maintain the inventory because they have the capacity. Gary Gorshing, SWODA Executive Director, believes that mapping infrastructure for GASB 34 has added value benefits for planning and other purposes. According to Gorshing, “Because we will know the exact location, size and value of every piece of government-owned property, from pipes to bridges to vehicles and so on, we will be perfectly positioned to plan our programs and services accordingly.”

By Kelly Novak, NADO Research Foundation Research Manager, and Laurie Thompson, NADO Research Foundation Director of Programs

For more information, contact Darrell Cook of Mountainland AOG at (801) 229-3800 or dcook@mountainland.org; Chris Glazier of the Utah Department of Transportation at (801) 965-4381; Gary Gorshing of SWODA at (800) 627-4882, by email at gary@swoda.org or on the web at www.swoda.org.

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