San Marcos GIS Team Honored For Flood Response Innovation

The City of San Marcos GIS Division was recognized by the Public Technology Institute for its innovative use of technology during the October 2015 All Saints Flood.

PTI awarded the City its Technology Solutions Award for the use of the ArcGIS Collector App to assist in the collection of critical information on property damage in the immediate aftermath of the flood.

After the Memorial Day Flood, property assessment teams were sent to designated areas to categorize the damage with clipboards and handwritten forms. However, with over 900 addresses requiring manual entry, and only two staff members available, it took several hours to complete the maps that emergency operations officials needed.

When the weather forecasts predicting the October flooding came in, City staff realized they needed a more efficient way to collect damage assessment data that was sure to come. Using the ArcGIS Collector App, which staff had already been using for routine tasks, the GIS Division created a map containing a point feature for damaged property. This allowed the assessment teams to collect data far more efficiently during the October flood, and eliminated the time consuming task of manually entering hand written information.

Each team was sent into the field with a GPS-enabled tablet loaded with the Collector App, and collection time at each site was dramatically decreased. The Collector App also allowed photographs to be included in the attribution, visually enhancing the data with images of high water marks and other damage.

“The GIS team came together while the October disaster was unfolding to adapt this tool for emergency management,” said Mike Sturm, Director of Information Technology. “Their quick thinking both saved time and increased the amount of important data that could be collected and used by emergency operations officials.”