GeoDASH

Executive Summary

Small to medium sized enterprises (SME's) are the backbone of the Eastern Shores Economic Development Landscape. There are excellent training and counseling services available to the entrepreneurs and decision makers of these SME's through the Small Business Development Center Network, the Maryland Capital Enterprises, and the various SCORE chapters throughout the shore.

Therefore, DBED, BEACON (the Business, Economic, and Community Outreach Network at Salisbury University) and ESRGC (the Eastern Shore Geographic Information System Cooperative) have partnered to develop accurate, up to date, and regularly updated business and economic development dashboards that will be used by decision makers in small to medium sized enterprises in the private sector and by decision makers in the public sector working on public policy, economic development, workforce development, and community development. These dashboards will be online ad interactive. There feasible, all of the data on the dashboards will be linked to multi-layer online maps using state of the art GIS technology.

All activities will involve gathering ad presenting information for the purpose of Economic Development, Community Development, community development, and workforce support.

Goals

• Increase the accessibility to and the quality of economic information to the public and private sectors on the eastern shore of Maryland.

• Support Economic Development, Community Development, and workforce support.

• Create a valuable and sustainable product and knowledge base for information delivery and economic development within 3 years.

Press Release

Jim Garrity and Sarah Bunch have recently joined the collaborative GIS/Dashboard project for economic development and Transportation Planning being undertaken jointly by BEACON and the Eastern Shore Regional GIS Cooperative (ESRGC) in the Henson School. This is a two-year project funded at $183,000 per year by the economic development administration of the United States Department of Commerce and the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development. Project partners include the Mid-Shore Regional Council (covering Caroline, Dorchester, and Talbot counties) and the Tri-County Council of the Lower Eastern Shore (covering Somerset, Wicomico, and Worcester counties).

Drs. Memo Diriker and Mike Scott are the principal investigators. Dr. Danny Ervin as Director of ShoreENERGY, will also be participating in one component of the project involving the creation of map based dashboards for various Biomass sources in the six counties. These dashboards will then be used for determining venture feasibility for potential cellulosic Ethanol production ventures in the target counties. The Maryland Energy Administration and the Maryland Environmental Service are partnering with BEACON and the ESRGC for this component of the project. The overall project has four other major components. For more information about the project, please contact BEACON at (410)546-6001.

Samples of Interactive Dashboards

These Dashboards are a few of many GIS Dashboards that GeoDASH creates, for more samples be sure to check out GeoDASH. You will need Shockwave to view the interactive Dashboards, to get the latest version click HERE.