Adrian Clark participated in the Drew County Quorum Court meeting in Monticello, Ark. Tuesday night. The primary topic of discussion was the county’s GIS program. Dr. Robert Kissell, UAM associate professor and State GIS Board member, gave a presentation explaining the basics of GIS technology and how it can benefit the county. Representatives from EFS GeoTechnologies of Monticello were also in attendance to answer questions concerning digital ortho-photography and other GIS-related services. Mr. Bill Horn, OEM /9-11 coordinator, had collaborated with these experts for several months to bring this technical presentation and discussion to the court in support of the county judge’s vision of providing better governance through technology. Mr. Horn described his plan of action by listing three goals: the first is to field-check existing address numbers and road centerline data in order to correct the Arkansas Centerline File and Address Point File. This process is predicted to take around six weeks to complete; the second goal is to contract with Eagle to produce a high-resolution digital base map for the entire county, to be completed early in 2010; the third goal is to pursue the completion of the assessor’s parcel mapping. By leveraging the three previously developed data layers, the resources required to complete the parcel layer will be well within the county’s ability to fund such a project. The court will meet to finalize its 2010 budget next week and has agreed to provide full support of these primary goals.