Wisconsin Geospatial News

Looking Back – Part One

As most of you know by now, I will be retiring in early July. I’ve held the State Cartographer title for 18 years, beginning the position on May 20th, 1991. At that time I returned to my home state from New York where I worked for 16 years with the Department of Transportation in Albany. I went to New York following work on my Master’s Degree in cartography here at UW-Madison. So, returning to Madison was a real homecoming, and a very exciting change and challenge.

In the latter part of my NYDOT career I worked almost exclusively on map production and publishing projects all while in the process of converting from manual production methods to newer and very different digital techniques. During the early years in New York my time was devoted more to dissemination of mapping information, outreach, and presentations on sources of data and existing maps. Certainly, these were valuable early career experiences that prepared me well for the future State Cartographer position here in Wisconsin.

History of the position

The State Cartographer was created through language in the state budget that became law in 1973. This came about primarily through the efforts of two individuals, Arthur Robinson and Norm Anderson. Robinson was a world-renowned cartographer, author, and UW-Madison geography professor who conceived of and defined the need for such a position. Norm Anderson, a good friend of Robinson’s, was Speaker of the state Assembly in the early 1970’s. Robinson was instrumental in defining the responsibilities of the position, while Anderson assured its inclusion and passage by the Wisconsin Legislature in the budget bill.

The first state cartographer, Art Ziegler, began his appointment to the position in late summer of 1974. At the time of its creation, the position was placed within UW-Madison so that it would be insulated from the state’s political and budgetary pressures, and because the State Geologist and State Climatologist were already part of the university. Adding the State Cartographer seemed to be a logical step. Although the State Cartographer position has existed here for more than 35 years, it is still somewhat of a rare breed. I am aware of low-profile State Cartographer positions in a number a states that are buried within state agencies. The only other prominent State Cartographer position exists in Arizona.

WLIP: the early years

When I arrived in mid-1991, the Wisconsin Land Information Program (WLIP) was just beginning to hit its stride. The Wisconsin Land Information Board (WLIB) had been meeting for less than a year, and most, but not all, of the state’s counties had created the position of Land Information Officer (LIO), and started to collect the real estate recording fees that funded the implementation of the WLIP statewide. Those were dynamic times. Of course, I was new to the scene, so I worked and thought hard about my place in achieving the overall goals set forth by the WLIB and defined in the WLIP. In the law creating the WLIP, the State Cartographer was identified as a permanent member of the Board. Some years later that similar inclusion would be made with the creation of the Land Council.

During my career in New York I didn’t have much contact with local governments. Several days after arriving here, Bob Gurda, the Assistant State Cartographer, suggested I do some travel in-state to visit selected counties, municipalities, and regional planning commissions. I recall so clearly stops at the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, Ozaukee County, the City of Sheboygan, Manitowoc County, Fond du Lac County, and a month or so later, visits to Dane County and a half-dozen counties in the southwestern corner of the state. What an education that was, and an eye-opener to see how much different those organizations were in their approaches to mapping and land records modernization. Today, the magnitude of those differences has significantly lessened.

The prominent political and social structure role that counties have in this state, coupled with the structure of the WLIP has, over the past nearly 20 years, provided growth and stability to mapping, local land records modernization, and more broadly the implementation and use of geographic information that is not matched in many others states. The WLIP’s real estate recording fee has alone pumped more than $100 million into supporting local projects, employment, and training. I can tell you the program is regarded with envy in many other areas of the country. I can’t count the many times at various national meetings the question has been asked of me, “How did Wisconsin set-up a program to include sustainable funding? We could never do that here.”

Leaders in the field

Throughout the ‘90s, the WLIP prospered, albeit not without problems and controversy. The local grant aspect of the WLIP directed substantial funding into many counties and municipalities that lacked their own funds to begin the highly complex projects such as conversion to digital parcel mapping, PLSS remonumentation, acquiring digital orthophotos, and the training of staff to use this information effectively. As a member of the WLIB, I had the distinct privilege to observe and work with many of the leaders at that time such as Ben Niemann, Les Van Horn, John Laub, John Haverberg, and Mike Hasslinger. These folks had been envisioning this program for many years, so they had a very clear sense of where they were heading when the time arrived to implement their dreams.

As the WLIP grew into maturity, the Wisconsin Land Information Association (WLIA) was playing a parallel and vital role of advocacy and education. The WLIA, through its quarterly meetings, brought interested professionals together to learn, grow and network with one another. Many other states have non-profit organizations that play a role similar to that of the WLIA, but few sponsor meetings as frequently or with the depth as does the WLIA. Again, as was with the WLIP, individuals with vision and dedication have guided the WLIA, and fortunately as one volunteer completed a term of commitment, another was waiting to step-in.

Throughout the 1990s and into this decade, the State Cartographer’s Office has tried to be a leader, facilitator, and coordinator in bringing awareness to new trends, technologies, and applications. We led early education and awareness efforts on the existence and use of digital orthophotos, the value and importance of creating and structuring metadata, the indexing of air photo records and geodetic control monuments, the capture of land cover data through the WISCLAND initiative, and more recently the use of open source software, and “mashup” technologies, just to name a few.

National trends affect Wisconsin

On a national level, significant developments have also occurred. In mapping and geographic information system implementations, much more attention has been focused on the realization that there is tremendous value in the use of state and local data and associated applications. The U.S. Geological Survey, for the most part, no longer updates its standard quadrangle maps, although it is on a long road of trying to revive a form of this product through the National Map Program. In the early ‘90s the formation of the National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC) provided a big boost to establishing contacts and sharing of ideas between states. NSGIC has focused much of its attention on truly developing the concept of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI). Although we have a long way to go in that regard, NSGIC has provided much-needed national leadership and coordination not available through other longer-established organizations. For me, NSGIC has been a tremendous asset for identifying and acting on national issues that also affect the state of Wisconsin.

Next time…

As we moved into this decade, the geospatial landscape of ten years earlier continued to change dramatically. Some of that which was familiar began to change or disappear, to be replaced by the new and unknown.

In the final piece of this two part series, I will take a look at where I think we are headed, and comment on those things that I think are important for us to get there. Please, join me again in a couple of weeks for a continuation of this story.