The New York State GIS Coordination Program is happy to announce the Second Annual GIS Partnership Award.

Partnerships are an important way to share in the development of GIS and geospatial data sets, and to enhance the usefulness of those that are already developed. One of the ways that the NY State GIS Coordinating Body is encouraging the formation of GIS partnerships in New York State is by publishing a short description of real GIS partnerships on a web page at the NY State GIS Clearinghouse web site. The Clearinghouse web page is at http://www.nysgis.state.ny.us , and the GIS Partnership Summary page is at http://www.nysgis.state.ny.us/datcoord/partners.htm

The GIS Partnership Summary page has been set up so those who are interested in learning more about a particular partnership or partnerships in general can read current summaries about others' experience. Contact information is included in the summary in case the reader is interested in participating in the partnership, or in learning more about it.

The goal of this contest is to improve the effectiveness of this page by generating more summaries and by increasing the awareness of its existence. An award for the best partnership will be presented at the Annual NYS GIS Conference. To become eligible, submit a summary in the correct format about your GIS Partnership that includes participants from New York before September 30, 2001. Partnership summaries may be submitted through our simple on-line form at: http://www.nysgis.state.ny.us/gis/forms/partform.htm, or by e-mail to nysgis@oft.state.ny.us. If your summary is accepted for inclusion on the summary page, it will automatically become eligible to win. Examples and links to the format are provided on the GIS Partnership Summary page given above. Entries will be judged by a select subcommittee of the NY State GIS Coordinating Body on their originality and innovation, and the scope of the partnership, such as the number or diversity of participants or the dollar savings of the partnership. Partners whose summaries are accepted for inclusion on the GIS Partnership Summary page will also be asked to keep their summary current on a periodic basis.

Contact Bruce Oswald at bruce.oswald@oft.state.ny.us or (518) 473-5622, or Ed Freeborn at freeborn@nystec.com or (315)255-1743 x469 for answers to any questions.