Greetings! The recent storms have reminded us all as to the necessity of GIS in allocating and distributing personnel and resources to meet the needs of the citizens we serve. I look forward to meeting my fellow GIS professionals over the next couple of months at the regional workshops. It is always gratifying to stop, listen and learn from those that have been on the front lines in facing these natural disasters. Please take the time to be involved and share your experiences. With GIS growing at such an accelerated pace, it is difficult to keep up with all the innovations. These workshops will provide a fun environment where we all can share and learn from one another.
It is also my privilege to let you know that FLURISA is involved with the recent Statewide Consortium Effort. If you haven’t heard about it, please take time to review the strategic plan at http://www.floridadisaster.org/gis/capgrant/index.htm
There are many GIS professionals within our GIS community which have volunteered many hours to get to this point. Your support is appreciated and I’m sure there will be more information at the upcoming workshops.
After being involved with SHRUG for several years and looking at the successes of other regional workshops, FLURISA is dedicated to support each of the regional workshops. In addition, FLURISA would like to extend a helping hand to those smaller user groups in obtaining training and the professional interaction that are available at the regional level. The FLURISA Board has begun to seek corporate sponsors as a way to assist each of the efforts. We have already been successful in signing up our first couple of sponsors. If you would like more information on becoming a corporate sponsor, please click on the sponsor section found on this web page.
Again, as with any professional organization, we are only as strong as our membership. We need fresh innovative ideas. We need willing volunteers that can set aside a small amount of time each month to spread the news. We need you! I believe that FLURISA can play a major role in GIS for the State of Florida. By utilizing the structure that is already in place, we can assist in cooperation, communication and collaboration within the realm of GIS. Please join us.
URISA Webinar on the New Draft Address Standard
URISA has announced
a webinar entitled,The New FGDC Draft Address Standard: What does it
mean to you?, taking place on Tuesday, June 23. The session,
presented by Martha Wells, GISP, of Spatial Focus, Inc., and a member of the
Standard Update Committee, will be one hour in duration, including time for
questions.
Session Overview: Addresses are the most used locators of people,
places and events. But our address data at the local level is so variable that
it is often difficult to determine what the right address is. This webinar will
review the new draft Address Data Standard. The Standard is being developed by
URISA for the FGDC and talks about street addresses as data in terms of their content,
classification, quality and exchange. Learn how using the standard will bring
order and quality to your address data.
When: Tuesday, June 23 - 3pm
Eastern/2pm Central/1pm Mountain/12noon Pacific Cost: $25 for URISA members / $30 Non-members
Wendy Nelson Executive Director - URISA wnelson@urisa.org www.urisa.org 847-824-6300
FLURISA Educational Opportunity – Open Source GIS – A Practical Approach
FLURISA will be offering to its membership the "Introduction to Open Source GIS - A Practical Approach" URISA Certified workshop class. As one of the FLURISA goals of making available a variety of educational and training opportunities for the Florida GIS community we want to make this educational opportunity available to you in the Orlando area.
For a quick view of Open Source go to opensource.org.
The Introduction to Open Source GIS - A Practical Approach workshop includes presentations, a discussion panel with a Q&A session and lots of live examples. Participants are encouraged to bring a laptop and can follow some demos 'hands-on" using wireless internet access. The workshop consists of three main parts as follows:
Introduction to the world of Free and Open Source GIS (FOSS4G) and make-up of the OS community including crucial information about licensing.
Overview of Open Source desktop GIS and their capabilities and more detailed information on selected desktop tools. This will include live demos of desktop tools and exercises that participants can follow on their laptop
Interactive "Discussion Panel" and Q&A about OS GIS Solutions, how to integrate OS GIS into existing architectures and experiences from other users
The workshop is taught in one day (8 hours). We currently have 20 seats available (first come-first serve).
FLURISA is making this training available for FLURISA members only at the actual cost of $28.
This cost includes:
* URISA Certified instructor on site * Workshop book * URISA Certificate at the completion of the class * Light snacks and refreshments
The class is scheduled for June 30th, 2009 and will be taught in the greater Orlando area.
If you are interested in being up-to-date in the new GIS technology and saving a significant amount of money, send a Class Attendance Interest e-mail to Claudia Paskauskas - claudia@ecfrpc.org. If the number of interested attendees exceeds the 20 seats that are being available, a waiting list will be created and attendees will be contacted accordingly as seats are freed up.
