About Us
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| At
the end of 1994, an open-ended technical support contract was signed
between Penn State and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental
Protection (DEP). The GIS Support Center (GSC) was primarily set up
to provide many of the GIS-based services requested by DEP as well
as to administer other work conducted by Penn State under this agreement.
Under this contract, Penn State is assisting DEP, the Department of
Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR), and other state agencies
in the application of geographic information system (GIS) software
and other allied technologies to address environmental and resource
management issues throughout the Commonwealth.
Much of the early project work accomplished
by GSC and others at Penn State under this agreement was related
to GIS database and applications development to support a wide variety
of state agency needs. Over the last few years, GSC efforts have
been more focused on the development of specialized GIS-based software
tools to address water resource issues such as water quality assessment,
source water protection, and stream restoration. Additionally, GSC
has broadened its scope to include projects funded by other entities
such as the Upper Susquehanna Coalition, ClearWater Conservancy,
Centre County Planning Office, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
State of Nuevo Leon (Mexico), Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological
Institute, and the Mexican Institute of Water Technology. |