topic Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017 in User Conference Questions

The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

KathleenWallis — Tue, 27 Jun 2017 04:30:45 GMT

This was in my Facebook feed today from one of my fellow GIS professionals. We need to find out what the heck is going on. It seems that a new bill has been proposed by Warren Hatch that would "Limit federal contracts to A&E firms for almost any mapping-related data collection, analysis, or use activity at the exclusion of vast swaths of current GIS, IT, and mapping industries and related organizations." According to this article by American Association of Geographers
the bill would limit the “geospatial data” services proposed for restrictive procurement open only to licensed A&E firms by the GDA (see section 2 of the bill for the full laundry list) is wildly broad and encompasses data such as:

“all information tied to a location on Earth”;
nearly all GIS, mapping, cartography, and imagery data;
data that is represented by points, lines, and polygons;
data depicting the distribution of natural or cultural resources, features, or phenomena;
“any data used by a Federal agency”
Please read the link above, as well as this article published by GIS Lounge
I would like for this issue to be discussed at UC.

Thanks
Katy

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

AdrianWelsh — Tue, 27 Jun 2017 06:06:06 GMT

Kathleen,

A question I have is, how do you get "licensed" from the GDA?

Here is an article about it from GIS Lounge (with some tweets added in):

https://www.gislounge.com/aware-proposed-geospatial-data-act-gda-2017/

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

George_Thompson — Tue, 27 Jun 2017 13:00:04 GMT

It is interesting that the rest of the bill seems like it could be useful for the GIS community (lots of lawyer fluff) and the only issue is with Section 11(c). Having all the data that government pays for and collects available will help out may different industries that are using GIS to make decisions. I did not see anything specific in Section 2. Please feel free to point it out, I may have missed it.

Here is the full text of the bill: https://www.congress.gov/115/bills/s1253/BILLS-115s1253is.pdf

I would say to contact your local senator if you have comments or questions: U.S. Senate: Senators of the 115th Congress

Discussions Lobby‌ mapping and charting business federal data gateway

Note: These are my observations and not those of Esri.

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

JohnMcEwen__GISP — Fri, 30 Jun 2017 00:59:23 GMT

All of this legal stuff is touch to make heads or tales of and the bill isn't even that lengthy. The AAG is concerned that the GDA of 2017 will block out GIS professionals who are not architects or engineers (A&E) from being used by the government to provide geospatial data services. See their article here. Other professional orgs. such as URISA and SCAUG are concerned as well. I am sure that most of us do not see the logic in this bill as we are understanding it, considering that GIS is distinct from A&E and requires specific education, training, and experience that A&E would not have as a core of their education. At the end of the bill, it looks like it seeks to revise the definition of A&E to include GIS professionals under that definition. This is the current definition from here:

“Architect-engineer services,” as defined in 40 U.S.C. 1102, means—

(1) Professional services of an architectural or engineering nature, as defined by State law, if applicable, that are required to be performed or approved by a person licensed, registered, or certified to provide those services;

(2) Professional services of an architectural or engineering nature performed by contract that are associated with research, planning, development, design, construction, alteration, or repair of real property; and

(3) Those other professional services of an architectural or engineering nature, or incidental services, that members of the architectural and engineering professions (and individuals in their employ) may logically or justifiably perform, including studies, investigations, surveying and mapping, tests, evaluations, consultations, comprehensive planning, program management, conceptual designs, plans and specifications, value engineering, construction phase services, soils engineering, drawing reviews, preparation of operating and maintenance manuals, and other related services.

Of course, including GIS under the current A&E definition may end up excluding us if A&E means private entities who are specifically certified/educated in A&E. Most GIS professionals are not likely to to be professional engineers. We are more likely to be GISPs who were certified or passed a rigorous exam to earn the title granted by the GISCI.

The point is, being a GIS professional is much more broad than being an architect or engineer and includes everything from cartographers to data analysts to IS/IT professionals. Our content specialties are even wider and encompass everything from population and demographics to emergency services/homeland security to environmental studies. Limiting who can provide GIS services to the federal government to only A&E severely reduces the pool of supremely qualified GIS talent and places the country and local governments in economic and environmental danger.

At least that's the line that I put in the letter to my Senators and U.S. Representative.

I hope that everyone who has a stake in or opinion regarding this potential new law will take the time to urge their federal representatives to consider the bill's language carefully and look to the GIS community for knowledgeable guidance regarding this.

- John

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

ChrisDonohue__GISP — Fri, 30 Jun 2017 15:59:21 GMT

What is at stake

While most of the aspects of the proposed bill seem to be worthwhile goals, the specific mechanism of how work is contracted is detrimental to many GIS practitioners. As provided in the current bill, federal contracting would be limited to only Architectural and Engineering (A&E) firms. All GIS work would have to be overseen by a licensed Surveyor, Engineer, or Architect. Many GIS firms and organizations do not have a licensed Surveyor, Engineer, or Architect on staff, as such staff are not needed for the type of GIS work being provided, so having such an archaic requirement would be onerous.

History repeats itself?

The is the same issue that came up with the MAPPs case in 2007, a contentious case that roiled the GIS and Surveying world at the time. For those who didn't experience that one, it is good to read the legal background to get a sense of what is at stake and why this is so important to many GIS practitioners. This case rocked the GIS world at the time.

2007 MAPPs case:

http://www.aag.org/galleries/gis-procurement-files/2007_02_12_MAPPS_Case_Legal_Briefing.pdf

ArcNews Spring 2007 Issue -- MAPPS v. United States

Note that the 2007 MAPPs case was ultimately thrown out by the court due to lack of standing, but not after lots of acrimony.

http://www.aag.org/galleries/gis-procurement-files/2007_06_14_MAPPS_Decision_EDVA.pdf

Going forward - should we be concerned?

So back to the current bill. On the pragmatic side, so far the current Geospatial Data Act of 2017 looks like it is very unlikely to be implemented:

"According to GovTrack, the bill has a 1% chance of being enacted according to an analysis of the bill’s text by Skopos Labs."

Source: https://www.gislounge.com/aware-proposed-geospatial-data-act-gda-2017/

So while the potential consequences of the bill if enacted are severe, it looks unlikely to happen.

If the bills authors do decide to move it forward, hopefully they will amend the archaic contracting requirments to make it more realistic.

Chris Donohue, GISP

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

Rudy_Stricklan — Tue, 04 Jul 2017 00:28:40 GMT

As a professional land surveyor, you might imagine my bias J. Many (maybe even most) georeferenced maps and digital geospatial data are prepared by experts like wildlife assessment managers, archaeologists, and so on who are uniquely qualified to determine the location of domain-specific geospatial features, given appropriate survey control. That is to say, accurate locations of relevant project feature classes can only be derived from accurate survey control.

If you’re performing geospatial data collection for any nearly any federal project, its accuracy must be measured and stated per the guidelines specified in the Federal Geographic Data Committee’s Geospatial Positioning Accuracy Standards, document FGDC-STD-007.4-2002. In short, spatial accuracy reporting requirements dictate that accuracy estimates must be determined by the “…differences between project dataset coordinate values and coordinate values from an independent source of higher accuracy for identical points”. And of course there are specific procedures to be followed in determining and reporting those differences. So it’s not enough just to say that an expensive GNSS receiver was used, and that all observations were made by really careful people who are professionals in their respective fields.

It’s this statement of accuracy thing that usually bedevils non-surveyors. That, and the fact that risk-fraught mapping can expose the contracting agency to near-infinite liability in these litigious times, requires licensed professionals upon whom the wrath of licensing boards and sue-happy end users can be wrought. Professional-grade mapping involves and requires… licensed survey-proficient professionals.

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

JohnMcEwen__GISP — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 19:23:00 GMT

Completely agree with Rudy. When it comes to survey-grade field collection (which should be the case for virtually any government project), the surveyors who are trained to collect data with that level of accuracy are the people who should do that work. Just like when it comes to desktop vector collection, cartography, managing databases, managing web services, working with Python, or writing JavaScript/HTML/CSS, etc. there are people who are trained experts for each of these different components of GIS. No single GIS user can be expected to be able to do all of these.

That is why language in the bill (which does not appear likely to pass) needs to be altered so that it does not mistakenly exclude any of the experts who are necessary to any GIS endeavor.

- John

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

JoshuaBixby — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 19:44:50 GMT

Thanks for the context Chris, you saved me from having to write it up. It is good to be aware, but the probability of this bill passing, just like similar bills in the past, is so low that I don't think it merits spending much time discussing. The issues are known, the players well established, it is just politics as usual.

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

ChrisDonohue__GISP — Fri, 04 Aug 2017 14:59:40 GMT

FYI - GISCI has published their position on this. Note the suggested modifications to the legislation:

From the GIS Certification Institute: GISCI Establishes Position on the Geospatial Data Act of 2017

August 3, 2017

Dear Christopher,

You are receiving this email because you are an active GISP.

You may have an interest in this current legislation, currently in the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and scheduled to be taken up shortly by Congress for further discussion and action. We urge each GISP to review the bill and determine its impact on the geospatial community, and to consider contacting your representatives to advise them of your position.

The GIS Certification Institute (GISCI) has crafted the following position statement in response to the Federal Geospatial Data Act of 2017 (S.1253). S.1253 is co-sponsored by Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Dean Heller (R-NV) and Mark Warner (D-VA) has been a topic of much discussion within the GIS community. The American Association of Geographers (AAG) and the Urban Regional Information Systems Association (URISA) have expressed specific concerns about the bill as currently written.

Upon review of the Bill the GISCI Board of Directors has identified the following concerns.

Purpose Statement: The bill lacks a clear purpose statement. We believe this creates opportunities for misinterpretation of the Bill's intent. A well-crafted purpose statement would help "put a fence" around the Bill and minimize opportunities for misinterpretation.

Section 10 (Funding): We believe the language in this section is unnecessarily broad and could reduce or eliminate the availability of funds for research and other efforts not specific to the purpose of this Bill. A clear purpose statement along with some adjustments to Section 10 would help alleviate this concern.

Section 11 (Use of Private Sector): This is the area of greatest concern given the conflation of "surveying and mapping" with "geospatial data" and the potential that federally funded geospatial data activities could be limited to architectural/engineering firms and licensed surveyors. We are specifically concerned about the wording in subsections b and c, which state:

Subsection (b) DEFINITION -- For purposes of selecting a firm for a contract under chapter 11 of title 40, United States Code, the term ''surveying and mapping'' shall have the meaning given the term ''geospatial data'' in section 2 of this Act.

Subsection (c) MODIFICATION OF FEDERAL ACQUISITION REGULATION - Part 36 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (48 C.F.R. 36.000 et seq.) shall be revised to specify that the definition of the term ''architectural and engineering services'' includes surveying and mapping services and the acquisition of geospatial data, to which the selection procedures of subpart 36.6 of such part 36 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation shall apply.

We believe these provisions could seriously impact the livelihood of Certified GIS Professionals (GISP®) and unnecessarily increase the cost of Federal geospatial data collection and management.

The GISCI Board of Directors is confident that these concerns can be addressed while maintaining the purpose and goals of the Federal Geospatial Data Act (S.1253).

If you have any questions about our position, please don't hesitate to contact me!

Thanks for your consideration!

Bill Hodge GISP
Executive Director
GIS Certification Institute
847 824-7768 bhodge@gisci.org

GIS Certification Institute, 701 Lee St, Ste 680, Des Plaines, IL 60016

Chris Donohue, GISP

Re: The Geospatial Data Act of 2017

ChrisDonohue__GISP — Fri, 17 Nov 2017 18:17:53 GMT

Apparently the legislation was changed over the last few months, as several organizations released statements approving of the Act over the last few days.

Esri Supports the Geospatial Data Act

AAG Announces Support for Geospatial Data Act of 2017

http://www.aag.org/galleries/default-file/AAG_Announces_Support_for_Geospatial_Data_Act_of_2017.pdf

Chris Donohue, GISP