Work on GIS website puts Plymouth County on the map

Plymouth County's success with owning and operating a Geographical Information Systems (GIS) website will soon be known around the world.

Autodesk MapGuide Enterprise, owner of AutoCad Map 3D software used on the county's GIS website, wrote a customer success story that will be published in the company's trademark magazines, displayed at GIS conferences and on its website.

"The AutoCad success story will appear nationally and internationally," said Shawn Olson, Plymouth County's IT director. "It will actually put Plymouth County on the map."

The GIS website displays geographical information about the county including land values, a visual representation of property lines and dimensions, soils and soil types, topographical information like physical features and aerial photos.

That information can be used by various departments like when the assessor's office uses it to assign and assess property or when the auditor's office tracks a specific section of property to assign value, Olson said.

The GIS website can also be accessed by outside sources like for appraisal work, farmers searching for land boundaries or even citizens interested in finding information about school districts.

Different versions of AutoCad software is used by county officials to do engineering work like surveying and grading, Olson said.

The GIS website can be found on the county's website, www.co.plymouth.ia.us., by clicking on the "online services" drop down box and selecting "GIS Mapping."

Currently to log on to the GIS website, users must have Internet Explorer.

Olson is working on a newer version of the GIS website that will accept any web browsers, which is a program used to access websites on the Internet. The new site will also have updated information like new roads within the county.

He hopes to have the new version up within a couple weeks, Olson said.

Having geographical information available online has increased employees' productivity as they aren't constantly interrupted by phone calls, and in some cases has meant not hiring more staff, Olson said.

"The assessors office was almost at the point where they were going to have to invest in another staff person, but with AutoCad we were able cut down 65 to 70 percent on walk-in traffic," Olson said. "Appraisers and abstractors were coming in getting a lot of this information. Now they can do it online."

Those cost savings have allowed the county to own the GIS website, instead of having to pay a monthly contract fee to a commercial hosting company.

"Seven years ago, when we initially developed the site, we were one of three counties in the state to develop and host our own site," Olson said. "In two years we've actually paid for having it in-house."

Another benefit to the GIS website is it can be accessed any time of the day.

"It's another service we offer to people outside the 8 to 5 time frame," Olson said.

Although he doesn't track daily usage, Olson said he can see how many users are logged in.

"Throughout the day at least two to three people are logged in whenever I check," Olson said. "In-house it's between four and 10 (employees) at all times."

He spends only 15 minutes per week monitoring and maintaining the system, and using AutoCad software provides the county with flexibility to change and update its GIS website to serve users now and in the future, Olson said.

"They are the new generation of engineering," he said of AutoCad. "I've had a lot of appraisers and staff give positive feedback about having the (GIS) site out there."