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Like most small towns in the country, the town I live in has had budget problems for the last few years. Every year the cost of running the town goes up, and there is less tax revenue to pay for it. Last year, the mayor decided to hold a public brainstorming session to encourage the residents to share their ideas about how we could save money, and also on how we could improve life in our town. Like many of my neighbors I went to this meeting, mostly to see what we could do about improving our Main Street district. For some reason, all the new businesses want to avoid Main Street. The doughnut shops and fast food restaurants want to open up closer to the mall, and Main Street is starting to look like a slum with all the empty storefronts. The meeting was very informative, and the residents had a lot of great ideas. One of the speakers was a GIS software vendor. I could not imagine what he was doing here, until he showed us a presentation of all the things the software can do. I had heard of it before, but never really thought about how it could help small towns like ours. This salesman showed us how GIS software could save tens of thousands of dollars over several years. Instead of keeping many of our records on paper, we would have digital records instead. This would save so much time, because no one would have to sift through the hundreds of boxes in the records storage room every time they needed to look something up. It's really good for records that have to do with locations, like the Code Enforcement department, Planning and Zoning, the Highway department, and even Parks and Facilities. Our Mayor and Town Board decided to give the GIS software a try. The first thing they did was use it to chart the location of all the trees in the town. At the next meeting he explained how they accomplished this. First, the Parks Department employees went to each tree with a hand help GPS reader. This calculated the exact location with GPS coordinates. They also entered other data, like the species, age and condition of the tree. Later on, all the data was downloaded into the GIS software program. They were able to run a report that told them where they needed to plant trees, in order to provide shade and to keep the town from looking like a barren wasteland. Because of what the GIS software told them, they planted about 40 Lacebark Elm and Callery Pear trees on Main Street in front of all the businesses. The trees are still very young, but the street already looks so much better. Many of the residents volunteered to water the trees and to check them for signs of disease and for damage done by vandalism or accidents. From what I understand, the town is using the software now to plan for tree planting in the park, especially near the parking lots. The GIS software salesman told us that trees near the parking lots will help reduce pollution, and will keep the cars cooler. This means they will use less gasoline because people won't need to run them as long when waiting for the air conditioning to cool off the cars. Thanks to this software package, our Main Street district is much more attractive. When the trees are mature, it is really going to be gorgeous. The parks are going to be lovely as well. Now that the GIS software has been installed, we can use it for other things too. I think the residents really want the town to start taking care of potholes. This software can mark the location, so that when residents call in a pothole, the highway crew can know exactly where it is and can plan their workdays accordingly. I think this software is great, and I am looking forward to all the improvements the town is going to make.
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