2007

July

Tim Payne Named EMA Vice President

March

Need to Enhance Your Performance?

Running at the Red-line:
Mobile Technology Allows Field Crews to Update Map Data

Mapping the Future of GIS and WMS Integration

July 2007
Tim Payne Named EMA Vice President

Tim Payne has been named Vice President of EMA, Inc., the innovative management and technology consulting firm for utilities, public works organizations, municipalities, and manufacturers. Payne leads the West Region from EMA’s Seattle-area office. He has a strong business background with extensive experience in operations management, security, and emergency preparedness/ response.

Payne led the first Design/Build/Operate water treatment facility project in the U.S. – Seattle Public Utilities’ Tolt Treatment Facility.  On the Tolt Project, he directed a private consortium responsible for the project from design through construction and managed start-up and on-going operations. He also worked with numerous utility clients developing security implementation programs and facilitating emergency response exercises.

Payne is a City Councilman for Gig Harbor, WA and member of the American Water Works Association. He serves as a member of the Board of Directors for Western States Environmental, Inc. as well as the Environmental Coalition of Seattle & the Sound – a regional environmental education non-profit organization. He received his Juris Doctorate from the University of Arkansas and also holds degrees in English and Business Administration. His experience and expertise, coupled with other resources within EMA, leads to successful results in meeting the business needs of EMA clients.

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March 2007- Conference News - GITA's Annual Conference 30, San Antonio, TX
Need to Enhance Your Performance?

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA - It’s not the little blue pill – it’s the management tools you need to capture your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that translate into increasing your return-on-investment (ROI) sending dollars straight to your bottom line.
Utilities and cities around the world are implementing performance management programs. These programs organize their asset, customer, financial, operations and maintenance data into KPIs, many of which are spatial in nature. GITA Speaker Award Winner, Nancy Lerner, a Vice President with EMA, Inc., discussed how to use these tools in her interactive workshop on Sunday, March 4th.

If you’re interested in developing a performance management program but not sure how to get the funding, join Nancy on Monday, March 5th from 8:00 a.m. to noon for the seminar on Business Case and ROI for GIT.  Nancy and Conference Chair Mary Ann Stewart will provide practical advice and case studies for creating effective business cases to evaluate potential projects and secure the necessary funding.

Workshop participants will learn how to develop sound benefit estimates and prepare financial projections that inspire management’s confidence. Participants will learn to use the specialized financial analysis templates that are available on CD now from GITA as part of the research publication Building a Business Case for Geospatial Information Technology: A Practitioners Guide to Financial and Strategic Analysis.

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March 2007- Conference News - GITA's Annual Conference 30, San Antonio, TX
Running at the Red-line:
Mobile Technology Allows Field Crews to Update Map Data

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA - When is running at the red-line a good thing? When Honolulu Board of Water Supply’s mapping and spatial analysis capability allows crews to red-line map errors in the field.

The Honolulu Board of Water Supply (HBWS) provides these analysis capabilities to field crews using mobile-based hardware and software technology. Technology supporting field crew operations and the mobile workforce has grown rapidly in the past several years. The GIS group at HBWS, along with their consultant team from EMA, Inc., developed a mobile application called MANO. MANO eliminates the need for paper maps in the field. Users enter search criteria to call up digital maps for the Island of Oahu. Zooming in on map locations, users select additional features and see their attributes.

If map errors are detected, MANO users submit red-line notes to GIS editors to correct invalid data or move a feature to its correct location. Map data updates overnight; the new data is uploaded when users next connect to the network. Providing GIS field capabilities resulted in major benefits to the utility including the ability to: access the most up-to-date infrastructure information; view existing water system layout maps; identify feature attributes; query for specific assets; view land parcels, ownership, and easement information; and distinguish facilities by geographical location (e.g., street name, intersection, address).

Advanced mobile GIS software empowers field crews with sophisticated analysis applications. For example, these applications allow crews to automatically identify valves for isolation during main breaks and update GIS data through mark-up and red-lining capabilities. The mobile GIS application can be updated, each night or once-a-week, with new information captured in the central GIS database.

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March 2007- Conference News - GITA's Annual Conference 30, San Antonio, TX
Mapping the Future of GIS and WMS Integration

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA - Increased data redundancy, compromised data integrity, failure to provide the required functionality. Sound familiar?

As more utilities implement a variety of automated business systems, such as Work and Asset Management Systems (WMS), Customer Information Systems (CIS), and Geographic Information Systems (GIS), they continue to struggle with integration issues. In many cases, systems are procured individually and used independently by different departments even though they share common information. With the introduction of web-based services and service-oriented architectures, many organizations are choosing to dismantle their technical silos and integrate their business systems.

Skip Heise, a Senior Program Manager and GIS Consultant at EMA, Inc., presents a case study highlighting a recent project with the Honolulu Board of Water Supply (HBWS). The session, on Tuesday, March 6 at 9:00 a.m. in Room 214B, examines “An Embedded Approach to GIS and WMS Integration.” HBWS integrated its MAXIMO™ Enterprise Asset Management System (EAMS) with ESRI ArcGIS. The approach embeds HBWS’s GIS objects into MAXIMO’s web architecture. Users now have seamless access to both EAMS and GIS capabilities. Work initiation, planning, scheduling, and performance processes are more efficient and effective. Customer Service Representatives use the system’s mapping capabilities to display existing work orders against incoming problem calls – reducing duplicate work orders and allowing Planner/Schedulers to group work orders by proximity to create more efficient work routes.

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