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Inter-Agency Committee on Geomatics
National
Coordination Meeting February 8, 9, and 10th,
1999 Timothy V. Evangelatos |
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Workshop on
the Year 2000 Problem (Y2K)(1)
Col. John Dawson opened the workshop and introduced the National Contingency Planing Group (NCPG) and its relationship to the Year 2000 Problem. He stressed that this initiative is independent of the federal program for Y2K compliance and focuses on determining the risks facing the community, planning for various contingencies, and being able to respond if emergencies arise. The workshop included two slide presentations, reports from WG 1 and 2 Chairs, a demonstration of the databases that are being built to satisfy the planning and operational requirements, and a discussion. These are described in more detail below. 1. Geomatics Support Concepts for Y2K: The Government of Canada has developed a national contingency plan to respond to the Y2K threat and a National Contingency Planning Group (NCPG) has been formed with representatives from all federal departments. Should National Defence be required to assist civil authorities, they are developing an operational plan known as OP ABACUS. The NCPG has defined their initial requirements for various themes of geospatial information. In response Geomatics Canada and National Defence initially formed a steering committee and proposed four working groups to address immediate needs. Subsequently, the Inter Agency Committee on Geomatics (IACG) has taken over this responsibility. Dave McKellar described the three levels of government support in dealing with the Year 2000 problem (Y2K) as follows: - Departmental compliance to Y2K
Phase 2 of the Defence Geomatics focus deals with defining common views at three scales: 1:5M, 1:1M & 1:250K. This is probably the main interest for workshop participants. Dave emphasized that the federal and provincial geomatics agencies can participate in this effort through the coordination, integration, and provision of access to geospatial information and services to support the planners, and if required, the support to the response teams. Dave described the federal government organization, the National Contingency Planing Group (NCPG), the Canadian Forces OP ABACUS structure, DND's geomatics support, and DND's focus of effort. He described in detail the "layers" of geospatial data required and the national products (views) that are planned. IACG's role in supporting the NCPG is being defined by four working groups that have been formed and are listed below: - WG 1: Policy Issues/Data Sharing
Chair: Tim Davis (StatCan) Before introducing the WG reports, Dave concluded by stressing the opportunities and benefits for other federal and provincial government departments to become involved. Dave expects that some of the obstacles to sharing data that are being overcome in this special project may have a positive impact for CGDI later on. (Dave McKellar's presentation is included as Attachment 3) 9. WG 1 Report: Tim Davis noted that the Working Group was just established and plans to meet later this week for the first time. Data Sharing and the policies needed to accomplish this is one of the foundations of CGDI. Tim is leading this subject for both the NCPG and the CGDI. In Tim's view we will eventually have to overcome the data licensing issues and share data but with the Y2K hard deadline quickly approaching we will have to find a way around the bureaucracy and all pull things together. Statistics Canada, Elections Canada and Canada Post are now partners in the creation of the National Street Network File and have developed a list of guidelines for working together that may be useful as the starting point for WG1. 10. WG 2 Report: Bob O'Neil noted that in his division a small scale"data framework" is well advanced. It is based upon the National Atlas and a new base is being created from Vmap Level 0 1:1M data. A rigorous generalization will be used to generate other scales down to 1:30M. The GeoGratis web site is being used to manage and provide free access to the data sets. Later the CCRS image data holdings and a RADARSAT mosaic of Canada with 100 meter pixels will be available. Bob felt that the Y2K project might become the 'killer applications' needed to move CGDI froward. Like WG 1, WG 2 will meet shortly. (Bob' O'Neil's presentation is included as Attachment 4). 11. Y2P Demonstration: Following the refreshment break, Captain Kelly Fitzgerald provided a dynamic demonstration of the geospatial data bases that are being assembled to support both planning and operational needs for responding to the Year 2000 Problem. VMap level 0 forms the data foundation and is being handled on a province by province basis. She described the 14 data coverages required and noted that a major part of her work is discovering what data is available, then getting and evaluating it. There is no attempt to bring it together in a seamless national view. Tim Davis was curious where the power line data was coming from? Kathy replied that they are still looking for it and if required some will be bought. Col. John Dawson added that they are working through the IACG. David Coleman noted that the federal department involvement was growing but he asked about provincial contributions. Col. Dawson replied that the provincial contributions will be evaluated by the four IACG WGs. Mark Sondheim asked if there were any data sharing agreements between DND and the RCMP. Col. Dawson indicated that this is one of the tasks for WG1 to sort out. 5. NCPG Requirements: Major Bill Yee is a Liasion Officer with the National Contingency Planning Group. Following a description of the government's mandate he listed the primary tenets used to establish the NCPG. In order of priority these were: - No loss of life The challenge for NCPG is to evaluate on a national basis the threats and the risks that they imply and to complete this study by late March 1999. Bill clarified the roles of the NCPG for planning and coordination and the responsibility of DND to respond (OP ABACUS). The kinds of data required are: - Foundation Maps @ 1:1 M Scale
Bill concluded by emphasizing the importance of geospatial data for evaluating, depicting, and identifying interdependencies of the various risks. Col. John Dawson added that the media reactions vary from expecting total failure of our infrastructures to complete "ho-hum" expectations. NCPG is endeavouring to bring some order and provide a more realistic idea of what will happen in Canada. Although there are problem areas, Col. Dawson felt that Canada was in good shape compared to most other countries. Furthermore DND's experiences overseas, with the ice storm and the Winnipeg flood will enable DND to provide a better response if required. DND agreed to be responsible for OP ABACUS but would not coordinate the provision of the data. It is expected that this would come from other government agencies who are expected to cooperate. As John indicated no department would like to be taken to task later for not providing geospatial data critical to the operation. Col. Dawson is optimistic that IP and licensing issues will be resolved and he hopes the exercise will help further CGDI after the year 2000. Col. Dawson then asked for comments from the provincial representatives. Mark Sondheim asked about the data specifications, the point of contact, and if any data provided would be used after the year 2000. Although the expert on the data specification, Captain Fitzgerald, had left, Col. Dawson indicated that they were looking for current, attributed, clean, consistent data, which is also appropriately described through its meta-data. DND is prepared to work with the data suppliers to accomplish this. The point of contact is Col. John Dawson's office, J2 Geomatics. Réjean Castonguay reported several activities in New Brunswick that may be beneficial to NCPG. By October 1999 N.B.'s digital topographic database will be updated to October 1998. This includes up-to-date roads from the Department of Transportation, newly structured hydrography including flow direction, and new coastline. Another initiative that will be completed in 1999 is the coastal ortho-photo database with 1 meter pixel resolution. Arrangements for working with the NCPG will be discussed later. With regard to the copyright and data sharing issues, Tim Davis indicated that he was optimistic that they can be overcome for existing data but Statistics Canada and Elections Canada have not yet completed upgrading the street network files and he wondered if the work could be accelerated if there were resources for adding extra shifts. Also Tim felt that if they had more knowledge about some of the specific contingencies it would give a better context for them to prioritize their work. Col. Dawson replied that they would look at those questions; there are a series of presentations in March showing what may happen and after that they would be in a better position to make recommendations. In response to DND's need to discover what data is available, Bob O'Neil noted that CEONet is the place to start. Brad Fay was pleased to report that Nova Scotia has some of its meta-data in order, but they now spend a lot of time on data sharing agreements and it seems to take forever to finish them. Brad felt that if Nova Scotia were to have Y2K problems and needed DND's help, they would like to be sure that DND is using the best data available and he would like to facilitate the sharing process. It would be important however that the data is used only for the Y2K problem. Dave McKellar agreed with Brad and he remarked upon the good will that was evident in the workshop. Bruce MacPherson reported that Ontario would like to participate by providing data and also be the point of contact between DND and the municipalities. Heather Kinsley wondered if NCPG and DND have a shopping list indicating the most critical information. David McKellar responded that this is an issue, particularly in some areas, and therefore it is critical to get the four working groups together to determine data availability. NCGP is currently too busy doing risk assessment and don't always have the time to specify what they will need. Therefore, it is necessary for us to be proactive in foreseeing what may be required. Dave McKellar promised to advise the four WGs as to the current priorities (high, medium and low). Col. John Dawson closed the meeting by thanking participants for their interest and good response. He emphasized that there are 326 days left to go before the Y2K 'bug" hits. He looked forward to the recommendations from the working groups and to further contacts with the agencies that have offered to help. 
National Coordination Meeting on CGDI Mark Denis Everell, ADM Earth Sciences Sector, Natural Resources Canada, formally opened the First National Coordination Meeting on CGDI. He was pleased to see the strong interest from federal and provincial agencies, as well as from the private sector and academia. He noted that in Canada, geomatics is a lead industry and the country provides global leadership in both technology and in its approach in building geospatial infrastructures. He saw CGDI as a partnership between many levels of governments, and the approaches in dealing with intellectual property provide a good example of the cooperation that will enable CGDI to move forward. He is aware of the thorny issues that need to be addressed, but he would like CGDI to succeed because it will benefit all of us. It will be something for Canadians to be proud of and he concluded by wishing the delegates the best of success. Workshop on Intellectual Property (IP)13:30 - 17:00 February 8, 1999 The workshop was opened by Tim Davis who gave a short presentation (Attachment 6) on why the workshop was organized and its objectives. Tim Davis leads the CGDI thrust on the "Supportive Policy Environment" and he also participated in the CGDI Roundtables held late last year. During these activities it was noted that there was a strong interest in a workshop on IP and also for simpler, harmonized and more generic licenses for accessing data. This workshop will describe the activities currently underway to try to achieve this. Further the workshop will endeavor to educate participants on IP, in general, and its application to geomatics data in particular. As noted in the Agenda, David Feldbruegge will provide a lexicon of related terminology that will be followed by panel presentations by various experts. Tim concluded by introducing each of the panelists. 1. A Data Users Perspective: Over the past year David Feldbrugge and Chris Shadbolt have been conducting a research project to try to develop simple, more generic licenses for sharing geospatial data. In this work, they have studied data licensing policies and models received from nine provinces. Although government policies may vary, the goal is to have a license that looks the same with differences described in schedules that would be attached to the generic license. David described the approach used for the study. Furthermore, the terminology would be standardized and a proposed lexicon has been drafted but requires translation and will be circulated in the near future. At that time David will be seeking feedback on the lexicon and he hoped that users would become consistent in their use of the terms. If a term does not meet a certain need the term should be extended or else a new term should be proposed in order to avoid using the same word to mean different things. To facilitate understanding during the IP workshop, a glossary of terms produced by Natural Resources Canada was distributed (Attachment 7). Tim Davis noted that the proposed generic licenses are still being translated and were not available for distribution and he wondered when they might be available. David replied that there is a requirement for an initial legal review and was looking for some of the agencies who provided information to have their lawyers look at them. One suggestion was the IACG. To speed things up, Tim volunteered to have the group responsible for the Supportive Policy Environment do the review and he would look after coordinating that action. David Coleman claimed that he could go to a dozen web sites where he could access street address files and get information on his home, neighbors, etc., and he wondered if this was a good example of a multiple end-user license. Further, he was also curious on what financial model was used as the information was free to the user. Tim Davis replied that not all of the maps come from Statistics Canada but we do this kind of work and have several value added licensing agreements. Although it may be a minor example of how value is added, it shows the wealth of opportunities that are available. In the above example, the value added developer pays to get this information on the web, and part of the royalties that are entitled to Statistics Canada flow back to the agency. 2. A Data Producer and Data User Perspective: Kara Kelly suggested a simple analogy to describe some of the difficulties she has encountered in getting access to data. She asked participants to imagine getting into their cars in Ontario and it won't start, and then you realize you did not send in your fees to cover the four licenses needed to run the car (Federal government, Ontario government, value adder and distributor). On a national basis, Kara suggested that we could imagine the large number of different government and private agencies that would be involved. For the past 4 years Kara has been knocking on doors and not one of the data licences that existed then was applicable to her needs. In addition her company also had to licence the data they gathered to various companies who would compile it and then return it. Further, the users would come back for updates. Kara raised the question: "how do you protect the data?". She suggested that her company is able to talk to data distributors and car companies in a language they understand if the data producers would allow them to act on their behalf. Her company also had to develop agreements to track the distribution and licensing of their data, not only for maintenance but because not all users could be trusted to abide by the terms of the licenses. Currently her company, Navigation Technologies, is dealing with 10 - 15 data producers but this is just the beginning. Some of the things that must be considered are: 1. As a user wanting "intelligent"
road data you must be willing to give something in exchange such as: your
own database, quality checks, additional attribution. Heather Kinsley noted that Kara had been all over the world investigating international licensing and had touched upon some sensitive areas. Heather asked if there was a model being used internationally that Canada could consider using. Kara replied negatively but that she wished there was one available. However she added that you can build on experiences from each country, especially Germany and the UK. For instance, in the UK, they have the very restricted data access and usage policies. It takes 5 years to figure out a way to licence and were are still 2 to 4 steps away from the user. There are restrictions to consider as well - you can't produce hard-copy maps, and updates are required to get back to them. So the UK is a good example. The Netherlands amd Germany also have good models, but of the crown copyright countries, the UK is the better model. Tim Davis added that data producers like Statistics Canada are also often separated from users by several intermediaries and asked Kara to clarify her situation. In the case of Navigation Technologies Kara responded that they have agreements with system manufacturers and car manufactures, and in some applications the data is recompiled and they then have the responsibility to protect this data. Tim noted that the government is not alone in it's licensing problems and Kara responded that the challenge is to accept that responsibility must be taken to protect the government's rights as well as their own and to pass this on. Tim wondered if government agencies are allowing this and Kara responded that they are more and more, in fact her company now has 4 data providers. Tim closed this session by noting that Statistics Canada does turn over responsibility to other companies, because they each have joint interests and mutual objectives. This situation is feasible because both parties have an important stake or interest in the project. Tim has also found that when re-sellers protect their own data then any Statistics Canada data can be protected at the same time. 5. A Legal Perspective: Lou Milrad thanked the organizers for letting him participate and talk about how geospatial databases are affected by copyright. His presentation is included as Attachment 9 and covered the legal aspects of protecting databases under Canada's IP laws. He stressed the differences between the "creator" and the "owner" and informed particiapnts that although federal and provincial agencies are covered by the crown copyright, municipalities are not. International initiatives and their importance were described and he suggested a number of cautions regarding copyright. Copyright protects the expression of the creator but to maintain trade secret protection the work must be treated as an unpublished work. He also offered the opinion that digitizing a map is considered a translation and is therefore protected by copyright. He concluded by suggesting two scenarios for discussion. The first one deals with the rights of ownership for historically developed databases originating through all three levels of government and private sector utilities, where it is impossible to determine where the data originated; and the second one involves a possible data sharing alliance among private and public sector utilities concerning the sharing, updating and maintenance of common data respecting road allowances. Jury Konga asked the first question. He is interested in "turf" protection and related political issues and he wondered if there was a consumer advocate out there looking after the best interest of the community. Lou Milrad responded negatively, but indicated that there are ways to get this information out into the public eye. He cited an example where a client tired to get a new version of an official plan made public. The municipality resisted giving it out, so we treated the situation as a request under the Freedom of Information Act and easily got the information. Rick Morrison wondered about what laws apply when copying information from a web site, he asked when is something considered copied? According to Lou: a copy is a copy, and is considered so as soon as any form of media is put into a memory form. It is protected in terms of licenses, especially on the internet - most people don't bother reading the agreement before agreeing, but they are usually familiar with the general format of the licensing agreement. There is a concern with copying off the Internet because of it's international capacity. For instance, when copying a document that resides in Sweden, through a Canadian Internet site, then domestic Swedish law applies. The number of copies that can be made from the web site will depend upon the rights given by that site. Copying something off the Internet and then photographing it is probably a violation of copyright. Rick further asked if as a website operator I make a product visible to the public over the Internet, have I violated the copyright? Lou felt that it depends on what kind of licensing or agreement you have. Not all things on the Internet require a fee to be there, depending on the kind of product it is. If it costs money you have to make sure you have an appropriate agreement. Brad Fay asked for clarification on laws governing federal and provincial agencies but which do not apply to the municipalities. According to Lou Crown Copyright, the Queen acts at the federal and provincial levels for rules for the general public; whereas municipalities are created by a statute and Crown Copyright does not apply. Bob O'Neil suggested we reflect on where things are going. Copyright stems from an era when it was difficult to copy things and we understand that sort of thing very well (e.g. hard to copy maps). Today, however, our geospatial products are not much more than commodities and Bob wondered how much more should we do to protect ourselves. As an analogy, Bob cited an example that when you sell iron ore you don't put on a restriction that it can't be used to build a skyscraper. Some processes might not make databases look differently, but might may them act differently. Lou replied that was a fair comment but new packages and compliations are creating something new and unique and there is a branch of law that prohibits/deals with this situation. Software or database products may contain a lot of creativity and unique information implying a whole body of intangible knowledge, while "bricks and mortar"are quite different. Today's frustration, which has developed over the past 4 years, is that we must begin thinking more globally (not nationally) - because of the Internet. There is a new focus on global agreements and cited IBM who now develops global licenses. Another example is the value of canadian geospatial data to the USA, or vice versa. The mass merchandising company has a new international significance. 6. A Data Producer and Data User Perspective: Although Stephen Pearce was unable to give his presentation because of illness, his slides are included as Attachment 10. His goal was to present some scenarios based upon his experiences as both a data producer and a data user, and to provide the background that lead to the City of Calgary's development and application of generic licences. 7. Problems, Issues, Lessons and Solutions: Chris Jones began his presentation by noting that one-half of the population is now employed in the "knowledge business." Furthermore, our communications systems are all being integrated, in a way similar to the national railways that were built a century ago and we are now trying to fill the railway cars. Technology to produce and distribute data are ready to use but we do not have a business model to appropriately exploit our geospatial data. This is an important issue in Canada and he noted that in the US, this sector is growing at twice the average growth rate of the US economy. He cited a Price Waterhouse study as showing that: - Data infrastructure involvement
is 4 times the data handling aspect Enlarging on some of these points, Chris claimed that copyright may be automatic but should not be taken for granted. Also he felt that trying to collect money and still protect the copyright may not be economically viable. In his view copyright is like a "genie." Copyright exists to provide orderly access, for others it is just an asset. In Canada the "tax-man" has invested a lot of money into geospatial data and currently spends about $200M a year in this area. A company must be able to guarantee protection for its data and the government should have the same privilege. Licenses convey permission for the licensee to do what the license says - no more, no less. The government wants a return on its investment and at the same time the licence fees help avoid queuing problems and also provide a quality control function, i.e. if it is free who will care about it? The latter point provides a key argument for selling data and allowing market forces to determine the price. In the US data is free to the value adders who charge for the data - but the U.S. states themselves are not bound by this. With regard to royalties there are no hard and fast rules and Chris recommended that you should not be tempted to reduce the price on high volumes. The royalty should be based upon some easily measurable thing. There is a need to simplify licenses. NRCan has a large file of licenses and if Statistics Canada uses and distributes NRCan data then a value adder used by Statistics Canada cannot distribute the data until they also have an agreement with NRCan. Chris argued that we need a better model for these sorts of involvement. Chris considered the role of the 10 or 11 federal agencies involved in producing geospatial data and noted that there is no single entry point for accessing this data and all have different policies. Other factors are the degree of completeness and duplication among federal agencies' data, the variation in standards, and differences in distribution mechanisms. He felt that CGDI can be designed to overcome some of these barriers, but the model developed should be transparent to users with easy, clear access to meta-data, simple system for purchase and appropriate after sales support. Although there is a trend in government to the wholesaling of data, the government should not compete with the private sector. Chris concluded by indicating that government business models are not consistent and there is a need to educate the public whose knowledge on these topics is nil, while in the corporate sector it is not much better. The first question for the panel was from Dave Feldebruegge who wondered when does a "product" become a new "product" (for example a paper map being digitized) and therefore something which you have rights for? Lou Milrad responded that there was no simple answer. Digitization is a translation so the owner of the 'map" does not lose ownership when it is digitized. Lou cited an example where an employee with a knowledge of another company's property attribution used this knowledge to add attributes to a feature and caused an embarrassing situation as the employee did not have the right to use that information. When the employee was hired there was no due diligence review of prior knowledge. This is often a major issue in litigation. David Feldebruegge cited an example where the government put its data on the Internet and demolished the private sector that was working in that area, and he asked Lou to comment on the government's responsibility to protect industry in these areas. Lou noted that the government has a role to create a competitive environment, to open up the market and to foster innovation. Yet on the other hand it also has the responsibility to see that information is available and it is in the overall public good to do this. This includes making information available even if it is sold by a private company. Chis Jones added that if the government wants to give something away it can, although if it has a value Chris felt it should not be given away. If Agency A is selling data to Agency B, and B decides to give it away, that is ok if B is paying royalties to A. If the government is not charging for a valuable copyrighted product then damage is being done to the taxpayer. Bob O'Neil wondered how we might improve things and asked the panel to look 3 or 4 steps ahead and consider what we might be able to expect. Kara Kelly replied that she would like to see a few things. First, for data providers to agree on a common copyright symbol and usage. Secondly for people signing one or two licence agreements instead of 10-20 and thirdly, in terms of generic licensing, the foundation should be laid down, but the specific terms of exchange should be left to be custom tailored to the situation. Lou Milrad would also like to see three things. First, Canadians don't have a copyright for DB's. We shouldn't have to wait for a European directive on this - Canada and the US should come up with their own, and then over the next five years, harmonize it with the Europeans. Secondly, Canada needs a central agency to act on all of the government agencies' behalf. In situations such as the Y2K and GIS, we could use a 'central negotiating authority'. For instance, then Kara could deal with one authority instead of 5 or 6 to get started. This will drive the economy forward, especially where DB's are concerned. Thirdly, the norms for new models are changing. We no longer have to go out and buy new software to find out it's not what we need. We can download on a trial basis and can use the software. GEO is already doing this, but from a marketing perspective, this should really be used, it enhances the market especially for DB's. Chris Jones saw a 'one stop shop' for all of the government. This is already done in the UK but it still takes 5 years to get a licence and it's very restrictive (example of maps in the blue movie section). In future downloadings, copyrights will be encrypted into the data. Also we will see less level cascading (example of Larry Li's presentation & AMWAY) - the software is already there. Kara Kelly noted that five years ago they were able to work with the Ordinance Survey in the UK to set up a level playing field with common licences. Neil MacNaughton felt that with respect to copyright, the federal and provincial agencies may be at loggerheads. Several years ago the Newfoundland and federal government experienced cost sharing with NTS mapping. When a paper map is digitized, is this a different product? (Lou had previously called this a translation). When you change it into a topological model, Neil felt that it becomes a different product, as opposed to a raster scanned map which is just a translation. If value is added then it becomes a new product. In the past when the federal and provincial agencies were sharing the data conversion, the ownership of the data was never resolved, but an agreement was reached whereby the federal government maintained copyright but there were no restrictions on the use of the data by the provinces sharing in the data conversion. Lou Milrad felt that the federal/provincial issues were greater than the municipal issues. Two issues that he saw were consequential liability, and direct damages, and he recommended that potential partners should agree on a contract language before they set a business deal with pricing as the last step. Cris Jones added that in the USA, licenses are needed whenever new information is introduced, revised, or translated into another format or language, includeing electronic formats. In fact, just about anything you can think about requires a license. In Lou Milrad's view there is a marked difference between the government and the private sector. There are two issues involved. The first is indemnification issues and provisions. There is too much emphasis at the beginning on lawyer's language, which this should be at the end. Secondly, pricing tends to be the last issue to be dealt with. Lou has never seen a deal go sour from establishing pricing first, and pricing should be done up front. These two issues better define the business structure and allow it to move faster. Phyllis Charlesworth summed it up by asking, "where do we go from here? She said we have a lot of integrated data sets and we don't have five years to sort things out and so how do we move forward? Tim Davis responded that this was a good wrap-up point. He concluded that a few years ago he would not have dreamed that so many people would come out for a discussion on copyright and IP and wanting to make things work. There is a big movement forward in partnerships, etc, as well as a strong will to make it happen. The group that is responsible to see it moving forward is the Supportive Policy Environment of the CGDI, for which he is the chair. He promised to keep the group informed on progress.
Workshop
on National Framework Data Ed Shaw opened the workshop by welcoming everyone. He emphasized that CGDI is a national endeavor and was pleased to see strong federal and provincial participation. The workshop resulted from the discussion at the CCOG Meeting in St. John's in 1998. The focus of the workshop is framework data and for today, at least, he suggested that the group avoid straying into other issues such as data policies and pricing. He acknowledged that Mark Corey's leadership got CGDI off to a good start and now we are here for a few days to try and pull certain things together and to agree on the next few steps. Ed introduced David Loukes, one of the authors of the Geoplan Study conducted for the CCOG in 1996, who was to facilitate the workshop. 1. The Geoplan Report and Beyond: Dave Loukes' first two slides (Attachment 11) summarized the workshop objectives as: · To better define framework
data David outlined the background, context, and agenda for the workshop. This was followed by a brief history of CGDI, its current status and an overview of some of the issues in order to provide a context for further discussion. He reviewed the principles for CGDI which were suggested in the Geoplan Report. Key ones are: · Facilitate the sharing
of geographic databases; · Data included within the CGII should be collected once, as close to the source as possible, and efficiently shared among agencies; · CGII geographic data bases should be seamless as they cross jurisdictional and administrative boundaries; and · CGII data should be collected, processed, maintained and distributed according to a consistent set of fundamental national standards that will maintain the integrity of the data across all data bases which contribute to the CGII. David then summarized the efforts of the IACG, which proposed five basic thrusts for CGDI of Data Access, Framework Data, Standards, Partnerships and a Supportive Environment Policy, and during 1997/98 organized workshops and National Roundtable on these topics. Today's situation was summed up by David as: · Some federal agencies
have begun to work cooperatively Dave concluded his presentation by suggesting five breakout sessions to discuss i) Terminology and Definitions
Jury Konga raised the question of a discussion on standards with regard to core data but the participants felt that the workshop should remain at a higher more strategic level and not enter into a discussion of standards. Furthermore, standards are another closely related thrust of the CGDI that could be the topic of another national workshop later in 1999. David Coleman suggested that it might be useful to combine breakout groups ii) and iii) and if the group is too large then form two groups to discuss the same topic. This was agreed to. 6. User Community Needs for National Framework Data: i) Geoscience Knowledge Network: Following a brief introduction to the Canadian Geoscience Knowledge Network (CGKN) and the Geological Survey's component of that network John Broome summarized the framework data sets and framework architecture that they envisioned would be required for geology (Attachment 12). These are: Framework Data:
- Bedrock and surficial geology maps, 1:5M, 1:1M, … - Geoscience imagery; aeromagnetic, gravity, radiometric, … - geochemistry, geochronology, lithology, …
- mineral occurrences - parks, reserves, environment, geographic names, ... Framework Data Architecture:
Tim Davis wondered about initiative for broader participation of stakeholders and if GSC could benefit from the proposed single access window. John responded positively, The model used for the Geoscience Knowledge Network is similar to that used for CGDI and there will be direct links to CEONet, as one example of single window access. GSC will retain their identity for the GSC products. xvi) National Forestry Information
Systems: In his presentation (Attachment 13) Jim Wood described the
need for the NFIS and a summary of the framework data that they required.
The NFIS Theme Layers are:
Jim concluded by describing the progress in stakeholder consultations. The various players are talking to each other as they share the "same piece of land." CGDI sets the standards and they are looking at common areas of concern and looking for ways to solve the related issues. Ed Shaw noted that Jim had quite a long list and that later he hoped it may be possible to prioritize it. 65. Road Network - Part of Framework Data? In relation to the CGDI initiative to make geospatial data more readily available, Tim Davis wanted to discuss the critical nature of roads and how they might be best incorporated. His presentation is included as Attachment 14. At the federal level several agencies have developed some elements of a digital road framework; similarly provincial and municipal agencies are also developing road networks. Tim described many new and existing applications for digital road data. This included the partnership approach established by Statistics Canada, Elections Canada and Canada Post who have almost completed the integration of their databases into a product that is built upon the NTDB. Tim then provided a vision of extending the partnership to include the provinces. In the future Tim argued that a national framework would allow governments and geomatics industries to easily integrate their data and support many different kinds of applications. He concluded by stressing that a national digital road infrastructure is essential and should be part of the CGDI Framework Data. 66. Towards a National Topographic Framework: The Mapping Services Branch has been giving a lot of thought to framework data which François Faucher suggested is data that is multi-application, multi-user, and goes beyond a regional interest (Attachment 15). Based upon that definition, the NTDB topographic data must be a part of the framework data. The basic principles used in seeking partnerships in building the NTDB fit the CGDI philosophy very well and his branch plans to continue along this route. He saw the need for a homogeneous digital coverage of Canada with the unique definition of topographic entities. He summarized some of the areas of duplication of products that currently exist between the provinces and federal government, and the issues of incompatibility and maintenance. François suggested a number of objectives and suggested that all agencies work towards - "One feature, one geometry and one definition." The vision developed by the Mapping Services Branch is to establish a distributed database in a context that supports interoperability and concluded by describing the potential benefits for both producers, value adders, and users. 5. Provincial Perspectives on National framework Data: i) Ontario: Bruce MacPherson provided Ontario's view of framework data (Attachment 16). He stressed the importance of sound data management and felt that the key principle was: "Collect once, closest to source and use many times." He argued that framework data must be based upon national rather than federal requirements and vertical integration is required. He felt that the technical barriers to vertical integration of data are gone and the only remaining barriers are institutional. OMNR's role is changing and they are no longer the primary maintainers of much of the data. Land Information Ontario (LIO) has been established to facilitate the establishment of business models for core data sets and are working towards various partnerships. LIO is compatible with the CGDI thrusts and they will take the lead in establishing sustainable models in Ontario to satisfy the full range of requirements from the municipal to federal levels. ii) Nova Scotia: Nancy
Vanstone saw framework data as the national datasets that provide the
foundation required by multiple users. In Nova Scotia, the geospatial
infrastructure is called "GeoNova" and contains the "corporate data" that
is used by more than one department. This includes:
The primary datasets cover the
province, are built according to provincial standards and are available
to all provincial departments in digital form. The required themes that
users expect from framework data are:
In Nancy's view the requirements
for national framework are:
These data sets must be vertically integrated from the municipal up to the national level and she was very happy with the approach proposed by François Faucher. Nancy also discussed how partnerships could be established and how costs might be shared. She commended the IACG and NRCan on their efforts to date but she felt that we need to push harder on making this a national effort. She concluded by suggesting that 911 - Emergency Response might be a killer application and that the National Road Network is a priority. iii) Saskatchewan: John Turnbull gave a short overview of SaskGIS, the geospatial infrastructure being built in his province. He noted that the project began 15 years ago and was an important collaborative effort. Funding came from many levels of government and their program of cost recovery enables them to continue to move ahead. He showed a slide of the SaskGIS that is included as attachment 17. The data themes have been organized in three groups, namely: 1. Basic Multipurpose Framework - Geodetic Survey Base
6. Major Multi-User Information
Sets 9. Typical Use Managed Information
Sets John feels that Saskatchewan is ready to "connect" to CGDI and they have a great interest to move forward but the national infrastructure must be compatible with what they have built in the province. They already have a strong partnership with NRCan and now they are interested in closer links with Environment, Health, Forestry, Agriculture and Statistics Canada. With regard to national framework data John felt that the themes should match those of SaskGIS. iv) British Columbia: Mark Sondheim provided a technical perspective on national framework data which covered several aspect of CGDI: Data Alignment Layer: For real time, high accuracy positioning the data alignment layer can be a very effective tool in certain image and map-centric applications. However, in a larger context, the issue is high accuracy positioning and thus real-time, differentially corrected GPS should be included. A national perspective must encompass active control systems, with the objective of providing coast-to-coast coverage. An increasing number of application areas will be able to benefit from such a service. He felt that we should be pushing such a service as well as the related applications. Such applications include vehicle navigation, helicopter mapping, some emergency operations, some search and rescue operations, support for mail and courier delivery, taxi dispatch, road updating, some environmental surveys, etc. Atomic Units: Census, electoral and postal procedures require breaking the landscape into geographic units, which for their respective purposes, may be considered as atomic. The same is also true of police, ambulance and fire emergency dispatch zones. Since subsequent analyses often make use of more than one of these atomic datasets, it is quite advantageous if they can be easily related to one another. It is suggested, that as a minimum, such units should be bounded by physical, observable features where possible, and otherwise on a limited set of synthetic boundaries (e.g. municipal boundaries). If it were possible for some of these different types of units to be identical geographically or to be structured hierarchically, that would be even better. Time: Because of change detection, monitoring, versioning and real-time operations, emphasis should be placed on the most effective ways to handle temporal data. Time may influence meta-data, time-stamps, and coordinate systems (with time as the third or fourth coordinate). Within the context of a national data framework, consideration should be given as to how best to address and manage temporal data. Land Use / Ground Cover: General land use and ground cover data should be considered as having a national scope. Many environmental and economic issues depend on or can benefit from such data. It is recommended that such data be included in a national framework. US Data: Many problems involve not only vertical integration of diverse datasets, but also horizontal integration across the country, with our US neighbour, or even globally. It is recommended that the issue of integration with US data (or integration of their data with ours) be included as a problem area to be handled under our data framework umbrella. v) Newfoundland: Neil MacNaughton described the situation in his province. The concept of CGDI has solid support of the agencies in Newfoundland that produce and/or use geospatial data and it is their intent to work towards interoperability over the web. A Geomatics Steering Committee has been established, with cochairs from government and industry and they are looking at existing public/private on-line operations, meeting with both the industry and government sectors and developing a plan for implementing a geospatial data infrastructure in Newfoundland. Digital maps at scales of 1/50K and 1/250K now cover Newfoundland and half of Labrador. Conversion was done in partnership with NRCan. His department is a facilitator rather than a user but he sees them as providing a foundation upon which other things will be built. National standards are important and he sees core data as evolving to meet various needs. 6. Proposal for National Framework Data: David Coleman's presentation is included as Attachment 18. A research project involving Dave and two of his colleagues was to define and place the concepts of framework data, core data, and framework data architecture, into a common context, explain how these concepts relate to CGDI, to study how these concepts are used in certain provinces, and finally, to explore how the results will fit within the evolving CGDI concepts for framework data. Dave described the methodology being used and what they have learned so far. He looked at national efforts in other counties and then offered a number of definitions for framework data, core data, and data framework. He suggested five myths that no one believes but which are true in his view: 1 Federal departments make and
use only small-scale data. He concluded with an analogy where the comic book hero Superman was completely reinvented in a new universe and suggested this is not feasible with CGDI. Rather as Dave emphasized we have to take into account existing institutional barriers, existing standards and agreements. He was still very optimistic given that there is a lot of consensus to create the CGDI and a very positive will to move ahead is being demonstrated at this first national coordination meeting. He suggested that we get on with the job and not lose sight of good solutions on the way to trying to create a perfect one. If we don't do "it" someone else will. He closed with the question: "if someone out there had the ideal dataset what would we do?". 6. Breakout Groups: After a short lunch break the participant joined one of the four breakout groups proposed earlier. The reports from each group follow: Group 1: Terminology and Definitions: The group was chaired by Jeff Labonte and reported by Bernie Gloyn who acknowledged that the presentations given in the morning session were a good basis upon which to begin discussion although the group did not entirely agree with the proposed definitions and instead suggested the following terms and definitions be used: 1. Framework Data: A collection of geospatial data layers that are subject specific and support applications and value added products using a common geospatial reference. 2. Core Data: A subset of the framework data needed by most users, accessible by all, and maintained as the common geospatial reference. 3. Framework Architecture: The models, standards, technologies, and procedures used to represent, transform, and generally accommodate the integration, maintenance and use of framework data. Group 2: Core Data and Data Priorities: Paula Rojas chaired the group and reported that they had a good discussion, although only federal and provincial agencies were represented. They did not attempt to define "core data" as that was being handled by Group 1 but they assumed it would be the "base data" that all of us would need to work with. It would be essential data and scale would have an influence. The group suggested the following three levels: - Level 1 - Geodetic Positioning: Real - time coordinated (x, y, h, and t) network reference to geodetic control (DAL data is a tool for the substitution of geodetic reference and is not part of core data), - Level 2 - Primary Data: Names (Toponymy), administrative boundaries, land parcels, road networks, hydrography, elevation, remote sensed and aerial imagery, - Level 3 - Thematic Data: Land cover, geology, land use, soils, ecozones, utilities, forestry, units - census, postal and electoral. They concluded by suggesting that data priorities should be based upon: 1. Needs, 2. Drivers, and 3. The ability to quickly deliver. Group 3: Roles and Responsibilities: Nancy Vanstone chaired and reported for the group. They discussed several topics: Framework Data: This may include roads, hydrography, elevation, property and boundaries. National Road Network/Database: They agreed to use road networks as an example to look at roles and responsibilities and that a National Road Network implies the participation of federal, provincial, and local agencies as well as the private sector. "National"does equate with "federal'. Policies & Standards: The federal government should take the lead (facilitator) but involve the provincial agencies and users from both the various levels of government and the private sector. Core attributes should be determined and provinces may have expanded standards upon which to base this effort. National coverage should be ensured by the federal government and the data should be collected by NRCan if no other agency is providing the data. Data Collection: Provinces should work with local governments and whoever gives permission for their data to be used. Data Maintenance: The sources of the change (business transaction) must be recorded. Two possibilities suggested for ensuring feedback were: · Money ("carrot")
Data Access/ Distribution: Governments at both the federal and provincial levels need to ensure that access is available but they don't need (or want) to actively distribute the data. Further the database may not be a "real" or centralized database but could be virtual. Governance: An advisory council consisting of the private sector, academic, and non-profit organizations was suggested but it was realized this may not be feasible in the short term. Further, a Federal, Provincial and Territorial Council with a lead agency to represent each government (for example: The IACG, Land Information Ontario, GeoNova, SaskGeomatics, etc.) might represent a reasonable starting point for a governance model. Nancy concluded that a broad group would need to identify the process of doing all this. Group 4: Applications: Chaired by Sylvain Latour, the following report was delivered by Bob Ryerson. The group discussed three potential applications that are listed below but felt that the most likely "killer" application would involve the use of road and street networks and real time positioning for responding to various kinds of disasters and emergencies. 1. Roads & Street Network
and Real Time Positioning: 2. Location Services: 3. Public Good - land cover and
land use: David Loukes thanked the groups for the good work that was done in a very short time. He felt that there were several recommendations that we could use to build consensus upon and he opened the meeting to general questions and comments. Paul Jolicoeur asked for clarification of the proposed Level 3 Core Data. Paula Rojas reponded that the thematic data that was identified as being part of the "core data" are those themes that are in common usage. For example soil and geological data are important to many of us. Nancy Prout pointed out that the group's conclusions were made before a definition for "core data" was available and some refinement may be required. Brad Fay added that the Level 3 - Thematic is important and in his view nothing is more basic than geology. Randy Gillespie noted that geologic interpretation changes every 50 years. Dave Loukes asked if Levels 1, 2 and 3 imply an order of priority. Paula said yes, geodetic is first. David Coleman wondered how much data must be added to the road centreline to make it a value-added product? For example, the provincial agencies up-load data to Statistics Canada (S.C.) and then must wait until S.C. has resources to add the addresses. He asked what attributes are needed on roads to make them qualify as core data? Paula and Nancy Prout noted that the group did not have time to get down to this level of detail although they agreed that certain attributes should be included. Further in response to a question from John Turnbull they added that whether the data was freely available was not a consideration in defining core data. Heather Kinsley felt that addresses are a subject specific part of framework data and not part of the core data. Ed Kennedy had a feeling of "deja-vue" - this discussion was raised 20 years ago in the CCSM standards effort and he also felt some confusion about the context for core data in the overall spectrum of geospatial data. For Ed Shaw the context is to carry out the things that do the best good in the shortest possible time, other lower priority layers will be worked on if there are resources for them. Réjean Castonguay thought that priorities will be influenced by the availability of funding for particular themes but Nancy Prout felt that although we can all use additional resources "priorities are priorities." Chris Jones suggested that social applications did not appear to be getting much attention and wondered if anyone could speak for the "social user." Randy Gillespie replied that, in Newfoundland, they had been through a stakeholders process that had considered social issues and he found that people were getting excited about the possibilities. Denis Genest added that it was unfortunate that Health Canada was unable to attend the meeting since they are working with provincial partners to develop a geospatial component for the new national Health Information System. In Ontario, Nancy Prout noted that for the LIO strategy, a working group is looking at socio-economic issues. In Nova Scotia, Brad Fay reported that the Department of Health is using a lot of business geographics and would like a better atomic unit for collecting geospatial data as the postal codes are not good enough. Brad added that electoral boundaries defined on each community would help. According to Hershell Sax, Elections Canada uses the road network not only for operational use but also for business opportunities arising from voter turnover. The electoral boundaries are based on various factors but national reports can be used with other information such as voting age as one example of the social aspects. David Coleman was heartened by what he heard but whatever develops in the months ahead it appeared that road networks are a priority. He noted that in the Monday morning Y2K workshop Kathy Fitzgerald reported that DND's road data was 3 years old and Dave wondered what is involved in getting this data updated, he asked what has to be done to get the flow of new data a little easier? He suggested we try to reduce the turnaround time from when the provinces get the data to the time it is available nationally to the rest of us. Brad responded that Nova Scotia is working on roads but there are some issues; for example: · unless the name of the
road is correctly labelled, then things don't line up and there are problems,
Heather Kinsley did not feel that the definitions for framework data dealt adequately with roads, although she realized that the definition would likely go through several iterations before being fully accepted. To help clarify things as well as deal with the issues discussed, she suggested that we take road data and work it 'through" from the provincial to the federal levels. David Loukes agreed but as time was getting short he asked the group to focus upon how we are to move CGDI forward. He asked participants if they agreed with the definitions proposed earlier. Phyllis Charlesworth recommended that we accept them and get on with other issues. This was accepted and David then asked the group if we should focus on "core data" and start by concentrating on "roads." Mark inquired if access issues would be included. The consensus was yes to both questions. Jury Konga who participated in the breakout group on applications and satisfying user needs wondered how the focus on core data would relate to our attempt to find a "killer application." Nancy Vanstone asked how do our policies fit in? Jeff Labonte responded that policy, per se, was not discussed in developing the definitions but in talking about models, standards, etc. are there elements of policy? Nancy Vanstone felt that they were all elements of policy; for example, data access implies access policies. John Turnbull asked if addressing would be part of the road initiative and he argued that addressing should be part of framework data. Dave Loukes agreed, although he also indicated that he is part of a Nova Scotia project where addresses are not part of the road network but contained in a separate file independent of roads. Heather Kinsley suggested that if we want to get the attention of our politicians we should look at an integrated road application and develop a database that supports 911 and Health Canada's information system. Both rely on the same basic data. In her opinion, if we lined up on those two applications we can satisfy the requirement described by the military for the Y2K project as well as for 911 where addresses and names are needed with the roads. Sheila Rambeau agreed with this proposal since at Statistics Canada all are required there. Peter Schut added that roads were part of the discussion on finding a "killer application and traffic directions, turning rules, road classes and conditions may be a second layer of such a database. Further it would provide opportunities for the private sector to add value. In his view it was doable. Dave Loukes tried to summarize: We have agreed to the three definitions and he asked if there is a consensus that a national road network centreline database be created as part of the framework data. Phyllis Charlesworth agreed that roads are a "killer application" but she argued that we should not limit our activities to that one thing, as the GSC cannot contribute to a road database. Dave Loukes agreed, he was not trying to limit the scope but trying to build consensus on moving the CGDI agenda forward. A road database would be one initial focus to drive and demonstrate CGDI and show that we can work together and build something that is required. It would be a proof of concept and not exclude other possibilities. Mark Sondheim suggested that hydrography be included and that would be enough for a base map. Paula Rojas cautioned to include geodetic positioning so you know where you are and felt that elevation should be included. Heather cautioned that in the past road networks were removed from the agenda because of private sector issues. Ed concurred that issues arise when government publish data that is produced by the private sector and we would need to look at that, but he felt that if the data is available we should find a way to put it out. Sheila Rambeau agreed with Ed's comment and stressed that we use the 911 application to take us out of our "ivory tower;" we will have to address issues of access, policies and procedures. Dave Loukes concurred but Sylvian Latour felt that our policies would kill such an initiative. This generated another discussion on 911 as a killer application that Ed Shaw ended by admitting that there are political complications, but with a budget announcement next week providing $2B to health, a road network database may be a good choice. David Loukes again tried to conclude the meeting by suggesting that the group spend 5 minutes to give a clearer indication of the next few steps. Jeff Labonte asked what is the value of focusing on only one application and should we not consider demonstrations in a broader context and involve more users and their communities. He noted that 911 is done in some places but still a dream in other parts of the country. John Broome felt that if we succeed with roads and hydrography there would be no lack of applications. Phyllis Charlesworth agreed with Jeff's point, she felt we needed funding to do both in parallel - roads and hydrological network, and we should focus on doing them together. On this point Ed Shaw concluded the meeting. He was pleased with the discussions and with the remarkable spirit of cooperation that had been demonstrated. He saw a lot of convergence and he felt that the excellent presentations had contributed to this progress on achieving a national perspective on framework data. He thanked David Coleman for providing a presentation that set the stage for constructive discussion and Dave Loukes for aiding and advancing consensus. Ed's last words were "it was a good day."
Workshop
on Data Sharing/Coordination Nancy Vanstone opened the workshop by reviewing the Agenda and workshop objectives. These were: · Explore critical issues
related to data sharing and coordination among agencies and levels of
government to achieve the CGDI vision Nancy then reviewed a number of models of data sharing and some of the lessons learned and then asked Mark Sondheim and Brad Fay to share some of their experiences. Mark Sondheim described the Digital Road Atlas (DRA) project in BC. In 1991 the BC Ministry of Finance initiated a provincial Transportation Centreline Network (TCN) to help settle some differences between BC and the federal government over transfer payments. BC felt that the population was higher than estimated by the federal government and wanted to prove this. Road data was obtained from federal, provincial and municipal sources, with the first version of the TCN completed in 1991. Finance had no further use for the TCN and turned it over to Ministry of Transportation and Highways. However, they were not able to maintain it either. Last year there was renewed interest from such diverse groups as Elections BC, the Emergency Communications Corporation (E-Comm) for the 604 Area Code, the RCMP, the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, and others. Some of these parties were after navigation information such as turn restrictions, in addition to road names, route numbers and street addresses. Geographic Data BC established a program to provide positionally accurate road data on an ongoing basis, and with a consistent set of standards and specifications across the province. In addition to the road data, other geographic information needed to be provided to the participating agencies. Funding for the program is based on long term (five and six year), bilateral agreements with participating agencies. Included with the data are services to ensure that the various agencies can access the data as quickly as they would like and that they can use the data effectively in their respective applications or data stores, without the requirement for further processing or re-definition. The agencies with agreements in place right now include Elections BC, E-Comm, and Natural Resources Canada. GDBC put out an RFP, with the intent of finding one or more companies to handle the initial compilation of the road data and its ongoing maintenance. The RFP indicated that a number of options would be considered. For example, the government might own all the data or it might license it; similarly, derivatives of government data might be licensed to the company to serve as map backdrop to other commercial clients. The companies were free to propose creative responses, so long as the objective was high quality data at a favorable cost. The process was successful, and after a lengthy negotiation, a contract was put in place with a single company. It involves data under license moving both to and from the company, with certain rights and responsibilities assumed by both parties and by sub-licensees. So far the arrangement is working out well. However, it is also complicated because GDBC cannot distribute the data (other than for emergency dispatch operations), however it wishes. With other potential clients arrangements must be made that take into account the legitimate commercial interests of the company. Although this may seem onerous, it has its advantages. Otherwise, GDBC could sell a very rich dataset to StatsCan who in turn could sell it to competitors of the BC company at a much lower price, undermining the company's ability to sell the data to others, and in turn undermining the roads program. Nevertheless, there are legitimate ways over these hurdles, as demonstrated by the agreement between GDBC and NRCan, and hopefully in the future by other agreements that are currently under discussion. What is emerging is a model involving different levels of government, very different types of agencies, and the private sector. Tim Davis had thousands of questions but he limited it to one for now. With regard to the arrangement that BC made with the private company, who has certain rights to the data - why shouldn't Statistics Canada deal directly to the company? Mark responded that there were a number of issues including the fact that data for alleys was not included in the company's data set but he agreed that Statistics Canada could go directly to the company. Brad Fay described a provincial/municipal model in the context of the GeoNova System used in Nova Scotia. All geospatial data are treated as a corporate asset with reasonably free exchanges between government departments. Participation in GeoNova is mandatory for all departments, but each agency remains the custodian of its own data and provides maintenance of it. The Department of Housing and Municipal Affairs coordinates the activities of GeoNova and is responsible for the data standards in the province. They also sell the data to users outside the government and are responsible for negotiating any agreements. DFO, for example have access to the total database for an annual fee. The data exchange agreement has six parts as follows: 1. Policy Statement Larry Li was very encouraged by what Nova Scotia had been able to accomplish and he wished to describe some of his own experiences in developing a data sharing model used between Statistics Canada, Elections Canada and Canada Post. The agreement evolved over several years and had a number of pitfalls. The final model that evolved was quite different from the original "dream" model proposed in 1989. They did not get a large financial return from the effort but benefitted from improvements in operational effectiveness. Overall Larry felt that: - no one was worse off from participating
Maurice Bastarache wished to enlarge on Larry's comments. Maurice felt that what they have been able to accomplish now compared to what they had several years ago was largely due to trust and a common vision. He then asked Mark Sondhein what BC is doing with Elections Canada. Mark replied that the agreement is complex but part of it is a redistribution exercise where the software allows Elections BC to modify electoral boundaries to see how many people are contained in the new areas. From this analysis, paper maps are produced. Other aspects concern voter registration and verification and a need for a fast response for some things. The agreement is for 5 years. François Faucher added that a cost-sharing agreement for a single process and single outcome is easy to do but as data sharing becomes more complex, including data updating, multiple partners, each with a different outcome we must use a negotiated approach. As Mark Sondheim had mentioned, under CGDI it would be nice to have a single agreement. He then asked Brad Fay about specific agreements that Nova Scotia used. He wanted to know if the quality of the data was quantified. Brad replied that he had forgotten to mention that each agreement has appendices to cover such issues as quality but he admitted that to try and build a data base equitably with all the municipalities was quite difficult. Rick Morrison reported that for the Canadian Forestry Service they have had a tradition of data sharing and are making a lot of progress, and they have reciprocal agreements that benefit both parties. Nancy continued with her presentation and stepped through the principles for developing an intergovernmental accord for data sharing and presented a proposal for a CGDI governance model and its structure. She reviewed the principles underlying cooperation, the benefits of bilateral agreements, and of cost shared investments (Attachment 19). These were summarized as follows: · Discussion of business models in Accord - How to deal with existing relationships
- Bi-lateral favoured - Could take years - Emphasize mutual benefits (eg,
enumeration lists) She closed by suggesting the following actions and opened the meeting for general discussion: · A draft accord be circulated
to all CCOG members and IACG members for comment David Loukes complimented Nancy for a good presentation that was leading to a practical model for an intergovernmental accord. As a member of the private sector he felt he had a role, like the academic sector which is also represented, to be sure that the geospatial industry needs are known. In any bilateral agreement Denis Genest expected to find something about the business models for each of the partners. Nancy Vanstone felt that we must reflect what we have now which are a series of bi-lateral agreements. Mark initiated a discussion of multi-laterals vs bi-lateral agreements and then asked if we would be using a series of bilaterals or multi-laterals; he preferred the former. François Faucher agreed with Mark, we should use bi-lateral agreements for data sharing. He also expected that an accord drawn up for ministerial approval with 13 provinces and territories would take years to get approved. Nancy agreed it may take time but she felt that we must keep working through the CCOG, IACG and any other group that will help. We must establish a profile and an authority in our respective governments. Ed Shaw thought that the presentation was very good, although he saw some problems - trying to get a higher ministerial profile is useful, but there may be other options. For the federal agencies what structure is needed to bring things together? The IACG promotes soft leadership as well as data sharing. He felt that we might get new resources for data content and for investing in infrastructure but not for data collection and therefore he was asking that data be shared and we build the infrastructure for that. Ed liked the principles proposed by Nancy and felt that we can build on them. The working model suggested was also good, a single point of contact in each province and a single point of contact at the federal level. Nancy Vanstone gave examples of the kind of challenge that was facing us. In Nova Scotia, they have an inter-agency committee of 50 departments to steer GeoNova. She could visualize a federation of inter-agency committees from the provinces, territories, private industry and the federal government as an ideal way to deal with CGDI. Cost sharing would be 50/50 between the provinces, territories and the federal government and without those resources from the federal side progress will not be made. Yves Belzile was content with the principles suggested by Nancy but he was concerned with the hierarchical structure; he felt that something more flexible was required - perhaps a network of the local, provincial, and federal governments, as well as industry and the academic sector. This sort of model would speed up the process. Cameron Wilson thought this was a good model but with the need for data and cost sharing and government coordination the network model would fail due to the lack of financial support. Hershell Sax concurred. He saw the benefits of cost avoidance and the mutual gains for both federal and provincial agencies. Both levels of government have legislation covering electoral needs and could save money by improved data sharing. He supported the model suggested by Nancy and the focus on road networks as a concrete example to work on that was discussed in the framework data workshop held the previous day. The EC, STC and CP project will be finished in June. After that, they could look at Mark Sondheim's proposal for the maintenance of this data at the source. Such a project might be limited to 13 players and would be a good solid project that non-geomatics people could deal with. Jeff Labonte agreed that it would be an excellent way to go; it embodies the principles that have been discussed - so how do we move it ahead? Nancy went back to Yves' comment - she felt we were really talking about a network rather than a hierarchical structure - but some form of organized structure is required to support data access. Yves replied that he meant that the information is moving around all the players and the key is to put into place something that would have the information moving around in an organized fashion, perhaps a meeting every three months. Further he felt that the diagram of the proposed structure is not clear about this aspect. Dave Loukes sees a Board of Directors, supported by a Secretariat as a solution that could move thing ahead and Yves' concerns could be handled by the GeoConnections Secretariat. Jim Hamilton was concerned about the provinces' need to interface with each other and therefore care must be taken with how the network is managed. Dave Loukes countered that the model does not preclude any agency talking to another or sharing data collection. Hershell Sax was interested in a single point of contact with his partners but he does not want that to preclude municipalities contacting him directly to see if any of his data needs updating. Heather Kinsley concluded this part of the discussion by noting that at the last CCOG meeting a resolution was drafted up dealing with these communication issues. This gave Nany Vanstone the opportunity to report that a draft accord for CGDI has been developed and will be distributed to CCOG as a "straw dog." Bruce MacPherson raised a point that is important to Ontario; that is the vertical integration of road data. Both Ontario and federal agencies are doing the same thing and he proposed that an agreement for the maintenance of this data be set up. Details from the municipalities and the provinces would be generalized for federal requirements, this would entail the development of appropriate data specifications. Heather supported the idea but cautioned about over generalization as federal agencies need certain detail. John Turnbull noted that with regard to Bruce MacPherson's comment that we are not working on a new frontier but rather re-enginneering the government model. He saw it as a network of networks and a reasonable way to progress. He saw the need for both multi-lateral and bi-lateral agreements and he was encouraged by the responses by the federal agencies with whom Saskatchewan has had good relationships in the past. Dave Loukes agreed and suggested that an action item would be for the GeoConnections Secretariat to circulate the proposed accord to the IACG and CCOG membership and to GIAC, although it may be too early to send it out to industry and academia yet. Following a short discussion on who the draft accord should be sent to, Ed Shaw felt that is should be circulated to all sectors of the geospatial community and get as much feedback as we can. He suggested that we meet again in about two months to review comments and revise the draft accord as needed. The Secretariat will organize the distribution of the accord and plan the next meeting. Nancy Vanstone agreed but there were some other actions that should be considered. CCOG has recommended that someone be nominated to participate on the secretariat - could this also go forward she asked? Jim Hamilton supported this step but he noted that it was dependent upon funding and the provinces needed to look at that although he felt that they could move quickly. He felt that the GeoConnections Secretariat has suffered because of the lack of direct provincial participation in it. As agreed at the CCOG meeting the federal government would cover the salary and the provinces would cover relocation and moving expenses. Jim Hamilton promised to report back to the secretariat by the end of February and advised that the provinces will be asked to provide some funding. Nancy Vanstone asked if the group wished to suggest an action item on overall funding for CGDI. She noted that the federal government has a proposal in the new budget but that the provinces have not come to terms with the issue. John Turnbull agreed that it was an important issue but he felt that most of the agencies have some funding that could be re-distributed under a CGDI context. On his return to Saskatchewan he promised to discuss this with his superiors. He felt he could start with things like road networks, health and emergency response applications, etc. Jim Hamilton wondered if we should present something on an infrastructure program dealing with federal/provincial/municipal projects and cost sharing which is a problem for all of us. Ontario will soon make an announcement that they will respond to the CGDI thrust and they are trying to have it built into the political process in the next month. He suggested that a decision on a 50% cost sharing CGDI infrastructure program could go a long way in helping the political process in Ontario. Nancy Vanstone added that the provinces would be willing to redirect priorities and build upon such a cost sharing agreement. Ed Shaw promised that the federal government would play its role in such an accord if the funding becomes available. David Loukes closed the meeting by summarizing the actions, which are: 1. Circulation of the draft CGDI
Accord by the GeoConnections Secretariat.
Conclusions
and Recommendations Ed Shaw opened the meeting whose primary purpose was to provide a summary of the results of the three workshops held during the past three days. He asked Tim Davis, who chaired the workshop on Intellectual Property to summarize that workshop. Tim reported that the workshop objectives were met (Attachment 21). Participants now have a better understanding of Intellectual Property and we have drafts of: - A Lexicon These documents will be reviewed by the Supportive Policy Environment Group but the next step is to start using these tools and improve them or add new ones where they don't fit adequately. With regard to licenses to support Multiple Sources (suppliers), a project is currently underway with Forum Consulting to develop licences for end users, resellers and value-added resellers. The goal is to realize "one stop shopping" for integrated geomatics data produced by multiple suppliers and in Tim's view the next steps are to: 1. Create "supplier partnerships"
rather than multiple suppliers Future work would be to deal with other non-distribution policy issues that will arise as the CGDI is created. Phyllis Charlesworth asked about the feasibility of an integrated product licence for the Internet. Tim responded by noting that since Statistics Canada reviewed their policies a few years ago Internet use has mushroomed and passed them by. In the past it was not possible to measure "hits" from web users and it was not possible to include the Internet in the business/private sector models that were developed then. Now, of course, STC has to change as the users want an integrated Internet license. As time was getting short, Ed Shaw summarized the Workshop on Framework Data. He felt that the presentations were very good and he was pleased with the consensus for the definition and use of the three terms, namely Framework Data, Core Data and Framework Data Architecture. He suggested we begin to use them right away. In terms of Framework Data content there was a lot of discussion on "road networks" which have a number of high profile applications. With regard to the conclusions on roles and responsibilities these were discussed in detail in the Wednesday morning workshop on data sharing and he asked Nancy Vanstone to summarize that workshop. Nancy Vanstone provided a recap of the session on Data Sharing. Several examples provided by Mark Sondheim, Brad Fey and Larry Li gave clear messages that data sharing has to be built upon mutual benefits and trust. Bi-lateral agreements can become complex and multi-lateral agreements are even more complex. More detailed discussion on data sharing issues illustrated the challenges ahead but the group arrived at conclusions similar to those identified at the 1998 CCOG Meeting. It was agreed that a federation of inter-agency committees would be the model for CGDI and some basic principles for working together were established. Need for the vertical integration of the provincial and federal data were discussed and a draft accord for the CGDI was tabled. There are many different agencies to deal with and the need for specific contact point/authorities was identified. Specific follow up points were: 1. The draft accord for CGDI will
be distributed to all COG and IACG members for comment. Paula Rojas asked if a five-week lead time for the next meeting was adequate. It was. Rick Morrison referred to a presentation given at the SDI Conference in June 1998 which described First Nations initiatives for managing their own spatial data and wondered if they should be included in the CGDI discussions. They are working on a national basis and they may have useful input. Ed concurred and mentioned that land claims is a national issue and he would like to see it pulled together. Jeff Labonte closed the meeting. On behalf of the GeoConnections Secretariat he thanked people for coming and contributing to a very successful meeting. He also thanked those individuals who gave presentations and those who helped organize the workshop. He specifically thanked David Loukes for facilitating the Framework Data Workshop and the Secretariat for their labours. List of Attachments 1. Participants
Y2K Workshop Workshop on Intellectual Property
Framework Data Workshop
Workshop on Data Sharing and
Intergovernmental Coordination Conclusions and Recommendations
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