If American citizens want a balanced and acceptable quality of life that is economically and environmentally secure, the states and the nation must provide a reliable geologic-map foundation for decision-making and public policy. In this time of government downsizing, the state geological surveys and the U.S. Geological Survey are confronting a severe geologic-mapping crisis. Less than twenty percent of the United States is adequately covered by geologic maps that are detailed and accurate enough for today's decisions. Critical ground-water, fossil-fuel, mineral-resource, and environmental issues require accurate and up-to-date geologic information -- almost always in the form of maps -- to arrive at viable solutions. There are hundreds of examples of the important role geologic mapping plays in our society.
In 1988, the Association of American State Geologists (AASG) and the United States Geological Survey (USGS) began to draft legislation that would require and fund a major, cooperative, nationwide geologic-mapping program to be administered by the USGS. The National Cooperative Geologic-Mapping Act was signed into law in 1992. It authorized major federal funding for a four-component geologic-mapping program. FEDMAP comprised geologic mapping to be conducted by the USGS. SUPPORTMAP included the background geologic research needed to accomplish the FEDMAP mapping. The STATEMAP component included geologic mapping to be done by the state geological surveys. EDMAP was the program that supported geologic mapping and training to conduct mapping by the academic community. The National Geologic Mapping Act of 1992 also required that a National Geologic-Map Database be established in order to make geologic-map information available to the public in digital format.
Legislation is pending in the Congress to reauthorize the National Geologic-Mapping Act. As of this writing, the measure has passed the House, and the same legislation is pending in the Senate as S317. The Act requires the establishment of a National Geologic-Map Database. The reauthorization bill contains the following language:
(¶ 1) Geologic maps contributed to the national archives shall have format, symbols, and technical attributes that adhere to standards so that archival information can be accessed, exchanged, and compared efficiently and accurately, as required by Executive Order 12906 (59 Fed. Reg. 17,671 (1994)), which established the National Spatial Data Infrastructure.
The reauthorization bill further requires that
(¶ 2) Entities that contribute geologic maps to the national archives shall develop the standards described in paragraph (1) in cooperation with the Federal Geographic Data Committee[FGDC], which is charged with standards development and other data coordination activities as described in Office of Management and Budget revised Circular A-16.
At the 88th Annual National Meeting of AASG in 1996, the Association established the Digital Geologic Mapping Committee with the following charge:
The Digital Geologic Mapping Committee shall represent all of the state geological surveys to help establish and construct the National Geologic Map Database as required by the National Geologic Mapping Act of 1992, and by federal legislation reauthorizing the Act. The Committee will work in direct cooperation with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) where the national database is to reside. The Committee will work with the USGS to establish and meet digital standards to be developed in concert with the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC). The Committee shall, with the approval of the [AASG] Executive Committee establish subcommittees to deal with digital mapping issues such as metadata, attribution, costs, and topographic mapping. It will also report on activities of the FGDC, the NAS/NRC Mapping Science Committee, and other groups from government, private industry, and academia involved with digital mapping standards.
In response to the mandates of the National Geologic-Mapping Act and the charge to the AASG Digital Geologic Mapping Committee, a meeting was convened in August of 1996, at St. Louis, Missouri, to begin work on the development of national digital geologic-map standards. Six working groups were established, and their responsibilities are elaborated by David Soller in the introduction to this collection of papers presented at the Digital Mapping Techniques '97 (DMT'97) conference held at Lawrence, Kansas. That conference and this USGS Open-File report are only one result of the work of the Data-Capture Working Group. Those who attended the DMT'97 conference overwhelmingly agreed that this should become an annual conference to share the outcomes of members of the geoscience community who are engaged in digital geologic mapping and digital geologic-map production. We look forward to DMT'98.
Thomas M. Berg
Ohio State Geologist
Chair, AASG Digital Geologic Mapping Committee