OGRIP presents 2005 Best Practice
Award to Belmont County
-- SDD Enterprise Shared Services, October 2005

The Ohio Geographically Referenced Information Program (OGRIP), the state's coordinating body for Geographic Information System (GIS) activities at state and local levels of government, recently presented its 2005 Best Practices Award to Belmont County and honored Ottawa County as well.

The awards were presented during the 2005 Ohio GIS Conference, attended by more than 300 GIS professionals in Ohio. The OGRIP Best Practices Award is presented annually to entities who are implementing GIS in a manner consistent with the enterprise-wide focus of OGRIP. The programs must demonstrate how they embrace the goals and objectives of OGRIP as well as demonstrate the integration of GIS into the daily operations of their program.

The Belmont County GIS Program received the 2005 OGRIP Best Practices Award for its countywide GIS program. This program is an excellent example of embracing OGRIP’s goals of collaboration and cooperation as well as demonstrating the integration of GIS into daily operations. Its large number of program participants is a perfect example of countywide collaboration.

The Ottawa County GIS/Location-Based Response System program received an honorable mention Best Practices Award for its county GIS project. The Ottawa County project as a whole meets the goals and objectives of OGRIP by using data that is developed at the local level by the people who know the area and have the knowledge and resources to ensure its accuracy. Because this program is in its beginning stages, OGRIP awarded an honorable mention to Ottawa County, knowing that, once fully developed, this program will be a prime example of OGRIP’s goals for the state of Ohio.

The annual conference is co-sponsored by OGRIP, the County Engineers Association of Ohio and several other organizations.

OGRIP is part of the Enterprise Shared Services office within the Ohio Office of Information Technology. For more information regarding OGRIP or GIS activities in Ohio, please contact OGRIP at 466-4747.