The Wilson (N.C.) Fire/Rescue Services continues to expand its Geographic Information System technology capability for community protection.

This expansion does not grow from a focused, homeland-security effort but rather from the continued application of GIS technology in day-to-day operations. GIS is providing emergency responders with the tools and information they need to make informed decisions in a timely manner, even under the most stressful conditions. These decisions may be relatively small, such as identifying which side of the structure to approach or which hydrant has sufficient flow on a commercial incident. However, these decisions also can be more complex, such as which areas to evacuate to minimize the risk associated with flooding during a major hurricane.

Late in the summer of 1999, the city of Wilson, along with much of eastern North Carolina, experienced just such a disastrous incident (Ed.: See “Wet and Riled,” December 2003, available at www.firechief.com). Hurricane Floyd left much of the city underwater. The resulting damage qualified the storm as a 500-year flood. During the weeks that followed, the city's GIS department made many maps depicting flood-hazard areas and damage throughout the community. It quickly became apparent that this technology could have been of far greater benefit if deployed prior to the event. This simple realization led WFRS to integrate GIS into its everyday business processes. While the fire department has realized many benefits from this implementation, many others also have benefited from the fire department's leadership in the GIS realm.

Early in the process, fire officials realized that data captured during one department's daily operations could benefit other departments if they had access to the information. This led the city to undertake an effort to move toward a true enterprise GIS. The first step in creating an enterprise GIS was establishing an enterprise spatial data repository that all stakeholders could access directly.

This meant that fire personnel could use information that was previously only available to the department that created and owned the data set. For example, firefighters could gain access to gas-distribution infrastructure data directly from their computers. This allowed first responders to quickly determine the size and material of a gas line when responding to gas main breaks.

In addition to putting critical response information in the hands of the people who needed it most, this effort also made data-sharing between other departments possible. Address data created in the city's engineering division now was available to every city employee with a computer — water department personnel could view customer information, gas department personnel could use the water department's infrastructure data, and so on. The efficiencies gained by moving all GIS data into a single database and providing direct access to the data have expanded the user base supported by the GIS and also increased the value of the entire system.

The next major realization came after the enterprise geo-database was implemented. As it turned out, providing widespread availability of GIS data introduced new challenges for ensuring the system was used to its full potential.

Prior to implementation of the new system, each department's subject-matter experts were the gatekeepers for how their data was used. This meant that each department was able to ensure all products created with its data used appropriate symbols. Because each department used its data in isolation, there was no concern about duplication of symbols among agencies.

With data access in the hands of the end user, it meant losing control of symbolization, and it created the potential for conflict when users began combining data sets from different departments into new maps and applications. One can imagine a scenario in which fire, police and utility personnel all respond to an event and each bring their own maps and GIS tools to the scene. If each user sets up the display maps independently, the possibility of miscommunication and confusion increases.

To address these concerns, Wilson created enterprise symbol standards. These standards ensured that every GIS product created or used by Wilson would display data in a uniform fashion and that there would be no duplication in symbols. This was challenging because the city maintains more than 200 GIS data layers. But as with implementing the enterprise geo-database, creating symbol standards increased the value of GIS to the entire organization. As an unexpected benefit, this generated efficiencies for power users, as they no longer had to set up symbology for each new map or application they created.

As more and more users began to access the city's GIS data resources directly, the city had an army of data quality-control technicians validating information on a daily basis.

Prior to the move to an enterprise system, GIS was seen as the domain of “those GIS folks.” Most city personnel did not have direct access to the system and so did not have a means of identifying and communicating errors back to the GIS. More importantly, most personnel did not feel they had a stake in the system because they never used the data directly. The enterprise GIS gave many more people both the means and the motivation to become contributors to the city's database.

Firefighters now pass information about incorrectly located addresses and missing hydrants to engineering, customer service representatives pass information about improperly drawn school districts to the GIS division, and water-resources personnel pass information about storm-water infrastructure back to the storm-water division. These are just a few examples of this phenomenon.

As system use continues to increase and GIS becomes more critical to city operations, the quality of the city's data will continue to improve. This is not always a pleasant process, as sometimes errors are found only after they have caused a problem. Nonetheless, as time goes by, the city will continue to build confidence in its system. Much like the human body, increased use of GIS data leads to a corresponding increase in strength. Sometimes the challenge is playing through the pains that come with the increased exercise.

Once the new enterprise system was in place and fire department personnel were reaping the benefits of accessing other departments' information, opportunities to flow information back to other departments began to be identified. A key example of this is the department's preplan data. Under the new enterprise GIS system, preplans can be made available to Wilson Police Department personnel both in the office and in their mobile command center. In the future, these preplans also may be available to officers in vehicles.

Specific data captured in the preplan process also can be used to update databases for other departments. Information about city-owned facilities can be pushed from the preplans back to the city's asset-management program. Information about facilities use can be used to update the planning department's land-use database. New businesses can be identified in the preplanning process, and this information can be passed to customer service to ensure proper licenses have been acquired. The department's vacant-and-dangerous structure layer can be used to supplement vacant structure information captured in both the planning department and the police department.

Despite these successes, there is still a long way to go to fully realize the potential of the enterprise GIS. The vision is to create an environment in which each employee has access to the information they need when they need it, using location as the common thread to tie together the city's many data sets.

In such a system, information will be entered once, stored once, and available where it is needed. Making this a reality will be a long and arduous task that will unveil new challenges. Nonetheless, as long as GIS consumers, such as the fire department, continue to lead the way in an effort to improve their own operations, the city will move closer to its enterprise goal and continue to reap benefits along the way.

As with any partnership, there must be a sharing of each department's interests and desires regarding their operations and goals. By sharing all relevant information and identifying areas of common interest, a plan that meets the expectations of all departments can be developed in a cooperative and collaborative manner. The success will be realized as departments become teams and the efforts transition into teamwork.

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Don Oliver is a 40-year veteran of the fire service and has served as the chief of the Wilson (N.C.) Fire/Rescue Services since 1992. He is the past chair of the International Association of Fire Chiefs Fire Prevention Committee. He is a director-at-large of the National Society of Executive Fire Officers as well as past president and a member of National Fire Protection Association. He serves as a member of the Board of Visitors for the National Fire Academy. He holds a bachelor's degree in individual studies with a concentration in fire service administration and is a graduate of the NFA's Executive Fire Officer Program and the Management Excellence Program at the Center for Public Service, University of Virginia.