Southern Nevada Agency Partnership Information Needs Assessment

1. Southern Nevada Agency Partnership Information Needs Assessment Geospatial ‘09 Thursday, April 30, 2009 Craig Palmer, Eric Landis and Mark Stalling Harry Reid Center for Environmental Studies University of Nevada Las Vegas

2. S.N.A.P. • The Southern Nevada Agency Partnership (SNAP) has been formed by the: • U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service • Bureau of Land Management • National Park Service • USDA Forest Service

3. SNAP Organization SNAP Board coordinates interagency efforts Fourteen interagency teams have been formed to coordinate efforts in specific topic areas: • Anti-litter & Dumping • Cultural Site Stewardship • Cultural Resources • Fire • Natural Resources • Public Affairs • Recreation/ OHV • Law Enforcement • Restoration • Science & Research • Volunteer • Wild Horse/Burro • Wilderness • GIS Team

4. Project’s Purpose • Purpose: assist the GIS team with the identification of a vision for sharing and utilizing geospatial data across agencies. • Requested by the SNAP GIS team • Timeline: August, 2007- July, 2008 “To coordinate the development of GIS and data management systems to support all the numerous interagency projects funded as conservation initiatives”

5. Project Approach • Task 1: Develop an information needs assessment form for interviews with the SNAP teams • Task 2: Conduct interviews with the SNAP teams and prepare individual SNAP team reports • Task 3: Synthesize results of INA reports for each of the SNAP teams into an overall report

6. Key Findings from the INA interviews • Priority base data layers- roads, major vegetation communities, special land use designation, trails, and land status

7. Key Findings from the INA interviews continued… • Data and information sharing within and across teams is generally informal. 3. Data management processes were inconsistent across individuals, teams, and agencies

8. Key Findings from the INA interviews continued… 4. Existing information systems are generally agency-or project- specific. Few of these systems (in their present state) seemed suitable for SNAP use by all agencies. • Example: • Restoration and Invasive Species • APCAM (NPS national effort for weeds) • Seed Collection • Paper 5. Each agency maintains its own procedures, standards, and tools for how data is handled from collection protocols to access and sharing restrictions.

9. Key Findings from the INA interviews continued… • Maintaining adequate staffing levels for SNAP data management activities is a resource challenge for most teams. • GPS and/or GIS training was requested by most teams. • New data products, especially those that support monitoring cultural site conditions and restoration efforts, were requested -e.g.. Fire team

10. Recommended Next Steps 1. Establish a SNAP Data Governance Program 2. Develop a Data Management Plan Template

11. Recommended Next Steps Continued 3. Develop a SNAP Enterprise Data Model 4. Develop a Business Process Workflow for Data Management

12. Recommended Next Steps Continued 5. Establish a vision statement for managing SNAP’s data 6. Develop a communications strategy

13. What Now? • SNAP GIS team to review and consider follow-up • Recommendations to be implemented for the development of the Interagency Restoration Database (considered a pilot by the GIS team)

14. Acknowledgements • Project:  "Information Needs Assessments of Southern Nevada Agency Partnership Teams“ • Funding from SNPLMA Round 5 Conservation Initiative “GIS & Data Management” • SNAP GIS Team: Don Harper (USFWS) Mark Sappington (NPS) Demetrius Purdie-Williams (USFS) Lewis Brownfield(BLM)