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GISMO is a New York City geographic information systems users group, which sponsors monthly programs for new and experienced users. The web site is a combination of GIS resources and outreach.
Projects I co-led, co-curated or otherwise participated in a special committee are listed below.
New York City GIS Advocacy
As a board member, I’ve been advocating for better geospatial awareness and operations in New York City government. I worked with a committee at GISMO, including former GIS Director Alan Leidner, GISMO Founder and Queens Historian Jack Eichenbaum, Consultant and former DEP geographer Wendy Dorf, with advisement from NYC Council Members Gale Brewer (then Manhattan President), Steven Levin and then NYC Council Committee on Technology chair Robert Holden. I had the opportunity to testify twice: Once in person in 2019 and again online in 2020. You can read our our GIS Principles and Policies statement and my testimony on the need for a Chief GIS Officer at the May 2019 NYC Charter Revision Commission.
GISMO@30 Anniversary Event
I was on the planning team for GISMO’s 30th anniversary in May 2020, focusing on our commitment to bring New York City back to the level of accountability achieved post-9/11. The theme for the 30th anniversary was “GIS 2020 and Beyond: Seeing our Spatial Future Clearly.”
Presenters
- Jack Eichenbaum, GISMO, Founder, GISMO historic overview and founding principles
- Wendy Dorf, GISMO, Board Member, Description and status of legislative initiative
- Alan Leidner, GISMO, President, “Underground Infrastructure Initiative, and relationship with OGC”
- Frank Winters, NYS GIO, “The Value of GIS in the Pandemic”
- Sean Ahearn, Professor Hunter College, Director CARSI, “The Geospatial Triade & C19 – Case Geocoding, contact/proximity tracing, & spatial diffusion”
- George Percivall, Chief Technology Officer, OGC, “Geospatial Data Science considering COVID-19”
GISMO@25 Anniversary Event
On the 25th anniversary of GISMO, I curated a Panel Discussion on Crowd Sourcing, Social Media and NYC’s GIS Startup Scene, featuring New York City-based GIS specialists and geodata users.
Panelists
- Noel Hidalgo, BetaNYC Program Manager, a Code for America brigade
- Aileen Gemma Smith, CEO, Vizalytics, MindMyBizApp
- Lela Prashad, CEO, NiJel
- Steven Adler, IBM Chief Innovation Officer, Africa Open Data Meetup: Ebola Data Map
Map Mosaic Exhibition at the Queens Museum, 2017
As part of the 25th Anniversary celebration, fellow GISMO board member Amy Jeu and I curated a weekend exhibit, Map Mosaic: From Queens to the World, on October 29-30, 2017 at the Queens Museum celebrating the map-making community. The event featured talks and demonstrations, children’s activities, as well as a hall dedicated to paper and digital maps submitted from the private and public collections of members of the GISMO community. These maps represent a wide range of themes including the diverse Queens neighborhood and demographics, urban planning, environmental studies, election analysis and more.
Geodata CEO Breakfast with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, November 19, 2014
On the morning of the American Geographical Society’s annual meeting, “Geography 2050,” I hosted a breakfast at Booz Allen Hamilton with GISMO president, Alan Leidner, in which we invited key officers of the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, including then NGA Director Robert Cardillo, to meet with and view presentations by the CEOs of several geodata startup and mid-maturity firms in New York City. Participating organizations included CartoDB, Boundless, Sourcemap, Interface Foundry, Ontodia/Pediacities, End Point Corporation, as well as the U.S. Geo-Intelligence Foundation and the GIS Director for the NYC Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications. These meetings are the first of several planned for the NYGeoCATs business development program.
GIS Startup Showcase, November 18, 2014
GISMO hosted a GIS Startup Showcase at the New York Public Library on the evening of November 18, 2014. I worked with Jessie Braden, Director of the Spatial Analysis and Visualization Initiative at Pratt Institute, to curate a panel of data users representing local businesses and data providers from local and regional government, academic institutions and library initiatives.
Data Users
- Jordan Preston, LavaMap
- Rachel Law, CEO, Interface Foundry
- Alexandre Winter, Placemeter
- Alicia Roualt, Local Data
- Joshua Campbell, Boundless
- Miguel Arias, COO, CartoDB
- Bianca Rodrigues, End Point, Liquid Galaxy
- Joel Natividad, CEO, Ontodia, PediaCities)
- Leo Bonnani, CEO, Sourcemap
Data Providers
- Matt Knutzen, Chief Librarian and Curator, NYPL Map Division
- Chris Barnett, GIS Librarian, Tufts University, OpenGeoPortal
- Colin Reilly, GIS Director, NYC DOITT
- Sam Wear, GIS Director, Westchester County
- Andrew Nicklin, Open NY, NY State ITS
Beginning these conversations helps New York City leverage the new technologies being created in our backyard and provide improved services to our citizens. In turn, startup businesses make valuable connections, including access to open and available datasets, which increase the potential to build traction and sustainability.