National Park Service, Midwest Regional Office, 1709 Jackson Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68102

D -- NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, MIDWEST REGION, GIS FIELD TECHNICAL SUPPORT CENTER PARTNERSHIP SOL RP606390016 DUE 071599 POC Theora McVay, Contract Specialist, 402 221 3487 The National Park Service (NPS) Midwest Region seeks to enter into a cooperative agreement with an accredited university to provide technical support and assistance for their regional GIS Field Technical Support Center (FTSC). The university-based FTSC is designed to concentrate the capabilities and resources essential to sustain GIS functionality at all 52 national park units in the 13 states throughout the Midwest region. Only universities within the NPS Midwest Region jurisdiction (AR, IA, IL, IN, KS, MI, MN, MO, ND, NE, OH, SD, and WI) may qualify for the agreement. Candidate universities must be equipped with the requisite GIS hardware, software (ESRI site license and image processing capabilities), peripherals (document scanners, digitizing tables, large format plotters, CD-R writers, slide scanners), training facility, and support personnel (principal investigator, UNIX/NT system administrator, GIS analysts) necessary to host the FTSC. Space requirements for two on-site NPS staff (including theregional GIS coordinator) and 2-3 university support staff (including both students and academic staff), are also necessary. Cooperation with a university is mutually beneficial for the following reasons: a centralized GIS setting makes it easier to establish standardized data processing procedures; the host university provides the expensive GIS components (hardware and software) needed to perform specialized tasks; qualified personnel are available to provide assistance and guidance (on topics/issues of applying GIS technologies to archeology, land use planning, vegetation mapping, cultural landscapes, natural resources management, exotic species, etc.); resources on-site make it easier to distribute information to parks and other cooperating agencies; location of the FTSC at a "neutral" site fosters the GIS program across jurisdictional and programmatic boundaries, and; co-location of the office in a university setting integrates the GIS program in an educational and technical outreach environment. Current annual budget allocations for the NPS FTSC average $110,000. There is a potential for increased funding levels to support the regional GIS program and anticipated wider integration of GIS-related technologies into other NPS functions. Inquiries regarding this project may be addressed to National Park Service, Midwest Support Office, 1709 Jackson Street, Omaha, NE, Attn: Theora McVay. Posted 06/07/99 (W-SN339852). (0158)

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