Government Achievement Award Goes to DHS GIS Team

Andy Swartz

The Wisconsin Land Information Association held its 32nd Annual Conference February 20-22, 2019. As part of the conference, WLIA recognized individuals and organizations for their significant achievements or service to the land information community.

The Government Achievement Award for 2021 was given to the GIS team at the DES Bureau of Information Technology Services (BITS), State of Wisconsin Department of Health Services.

Julia Olson

The government achievement award is given to a municipal, town, county, regional planning commission, state, federal, or tribal government or consortium that has demonstrated excellence in one or more of the following areas: innovative and efficient use of resources (best “bang for the buck”), sustainable development of critical local, regional, or statewide geospatial datasets, implementation of creative cooperative agreements, creation of innovative applications and information services that improve the delivery of government services to citizens.

Joe Tavano

With the COVID-19 pandemic underway, the GIS Team of the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (WI DHS) went above and beyond in their response and managing the datasets that the rest of the state relies upon. Evolving to meet data demands and managing the data input around the clock is greatly appreciated. Without this data, the numerous coronavirus information hubs, dashboards, maps and web apps would not have the statistics to accurately report updates to the public.

Benjamin Anderson

Great job responding to this unexpected and ongoing public health emergency!

Congrats goes to Andy Swartz, Julia Olson, Joe Tavano, and Benjamin Anderson.  As well as surge staff from other agencies that pitched in at times over the summer and winter.  Those 3 non-DHS staff that helped were Felipe Avila, State Historical Society, Kevin Burns, Board of Commissioners of Public Lands, and Mike Diss-Torrance, Wisconsin DNR.