New Mexico Geospatial Advisory Committee
GAC MINUTES
New Mexico Geospatial Advisory Committee
May 9, 2006
Porter Hall, Wendell Chino Building
Santa Fe, New Mexico
Chair: Leland Pierce (acting on behalf of Rick Koehler)
Called to Order: 9:40am
Recorder: Leland Pierce
Agencies and Private Companies Represented: Energy, Minerals & Natural Resources Dept.
(EMNRD), MMD; UNM-Division of Government Research; Resource Geographic Information
Systems (RGIS), Earth Data Analysis Center (EDAC); Office of the State Engineer (OSE); Dept.
of Transportation (DOT); Bernalillo County; City of Albuquerque; Los Alamos County and NM
Association of Counties; Bohannon-Huston, Inc (BHI).; National Geodetic Survey; City of Santa
Fe; Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO); State Land Office. 16 attendees.
The minutes from the April meeting and the agenda for the current meeting were accepted.
Highlight Corner – No presentation given.
Old Business

Statewide Geospatial Data Acquisition Coordination Committee – M. Inglis provided
update on the processing of the images taken of NM in 2005. Currently things are
moving slowly, as the USGS has only two people to commit to the quality control efforts.
The Digital Orthophoto Quarter Quads (DOQQs) for New Mexico continue to be
processed by BHI, reviewed for quality by USGS and sent to EDAC for inclusion in the
RGIS Clearinghouse and distribution to counties and partners. The compressed block F
(see block index below) DOQQs are now on the RGIS website and the uncompressed
data is being reprojected by county to State Plane feet for delivery to the counties. Block
C is expected to arrive May 9 and blocks A, D and E are at USGS in Denver for review.
Block B has yet to be sent. Two counties, Lea and Eddy, are fully contained within block
F and are being reprojected and prepared for delivery to each of the counties. Areas that
were in error in the first image acquisition will be re-flown in June or July. Each NM
county will receive all the color DOQQs for the county on a hard drive at no cost. This
includes uncompressed and compressed data with a buffer of one 7.5 minute quadrangle
or more beyond the county borders. All of the data will be projected in state plane feet.
In addition, a compressed county mosaic will be included. Each county will be asked to
assume stewardship of these data for the County as well as for municipalities and Tribal
lands within the County. B. Matthews reported that the Zeiss-Intergraph system is now
certified by the USGS.
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Block layout for image acquisition, DOQQ processing,
quality control as well as delivery to the RGIS Program for deployment.

Geoscience Summit-R. Koehler submitted an open letter to the State Chief Information
Officer, Mr. Roy Soto, in support of a summit to discuss the future of Geospatial science
and technology in New Mexico. In anticipation of this, R. Soto and M. Baca received the
go-ahead to put on this summit, and a meeting will be held 12 May 2006 to iron out the
goals and objectives of that summit, and who should administer it. M. Baca requested
names and contact information for anyone pertinent to the Geoscience Summit, and
strongly encouraged participation by the GAC. B. Matthews suggested coordination with
other states, such as Arizona, Texas, and Arkansas, who have taken on similar challenges.
New Business

Western Governor’s Association/NSGIC Resolution- L. Pierce, on behalf of R. Koehler,
brought up a resolution by the Western Governor’s Association that called for using language
put forth by the National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC) for future
geospatial efforts. Concern was expressed by the GAC that this would only add another
layer of bureaucracy to attempts to coordinate between states.
Announcements:
National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC) – L. Pierce reported on the
following activities by NSGIC:
1. Request for anyone help to build a business case for hitting the IT market/vendors in
terms of GIS
2. Asked if anyone has a GIS certification standard in their state
3. Discussion of the RAMONA project (an National inventory tool of datasets). One
argument is that we really don’t need to map-out where the datasets are, just an inventory
of metadata is needed, that state metadata managers will use RAMONA to build their
metadata and not be in FGDC compliance because RAMONA doesn’t have that
capability, and that their will be redundancy between RAMONA and the GOS; long
response from the supporters, basically that it’s up to each state to put the effort into
metadata, and, ”If you have great participation in your clearinghouse, your state and local
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government agencies are creating metadata, and you have the tools to support your
business planning and inventory efforts – then maybe you don’t need to use Ramona.”
4. Two questions on the legalities of using digital imagery-would such imagery hold up in
court, or does it have to be printed (no answers), and secondly one state rep reported,
“…state law recognized aerial photography as professional services and therefore not
taxable. The state wanted to consider digital imagery different - and taxable.”
L. Spear noted that the certification he went through was not that difficult, and that it would be
incumbent upon the GAC to stay ahead of the curve as far as state certification.

Western Governor’s Association – No report given.

Resource Geographic Information System (RGIS)– M. Inglis reported that most efforts
pertained to getting out the GDACC data, including thumbnails to accompany the metadata.

New Mexico Geographic Information Council – B. Matthews on behalf of K. Menke
reported that 15 people attended the workshop at the spring meeting, and over 75 attended
the meeting itself. A discussion ensued over the idea of NMGIC managing what used to be
the Southwestern Users Group (SWUG). G. Clarke provided history for the situation, and
discussion centered around the dissatisfaction of only being able to invite ESRI business
partners. J. Phillips noted that, as a volunteer organization, NMGIC would be hard pressed
to put together such an event without support.

Geodetic News – G. Neilson, on behalf of B. Stone, New Mexico’s Geodetic Advisor,
reported that the contract, with great support from the DOT, has been renewed for B. Stone’s
position. Among other projects underway, is a real-time reference network with the City of
Albuquerque, that the Grants CORS would be up and running by mid-May, and Deming soon
after. G. Clarke suggested some of the efforts by B. Stone might be put onto RGIS, with
funding from GDACC. M. Inglis and G. Clarke would meet with B. Stone and others to
discuss this. B. Matthews suggested involving the Professional Surveyor’s association.
Agency Reports

OSE- G. Clarke announced that personal geodatabases from the National Hydrological
Dataset were now available, that the databases were highly integrated, and that his office
would manage a version of it for NM, such that the national database could be
periodically updated for our state. Also, the OSE was in the process of scanning old
geospatial images of the state from film, and would have thumbnails available eventually
through RGIS.
The meeting was adjourned by L. Pierce at 11:03 am.
Next Meeting
The next meeting will be June 13th, 2006, at the OFS Conference Room, 3rd Floor, Wendell
Chino Building (EMNRD), 1220 S. St. Francis Drive, Santa Fe, NM, 9:30am to noon.
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