September 4, 2007 (Park Ridge, IL) - During URISA's 45th Annual Conference in Washington, DC last month, a number of the association's leaders were recipients of special awards.

URISA Leadership Award
The URISA Leadership Award is presented to members who have demonstrated exemplary leadership to URISA, creativity, innovation, and dedicated support of URISA programs. This year’s Leadership Award recipient is Dianne Haley, BSc, MScGIS, GISP.

Dianne Haley has worked in the field of automated mapping and GIS for the last 32 years. She is currently the GIS Program Coordinator for the Alberta Energy & Utilities Board and has held that position since July 2003. Previously, Dianne worked for The City of Calgary in the Information Technology Services Department for twenty-one years. She has a BSc in Geography from Queen’s University, a Certificate in Information Systems Management from the University of Calgary, a Certificate in Theoretical and Applied GIS from Simon Fraser University, and an MSc in GIS from the University of Huddersfield.

Dianne is a Past President of URISA International, and has been a member of URISA both at the chapter and international level for nineteen years. Dianne has served on numerous URISA committees over the years and is currently a member of the GISCorps Core Committee, the URISA Conference Program Committee, the ESIG Awards Committee and the URISA Leadership Academy Committee.

URISA Service Award
The URISA Service Award is presented to members who have demonstrated faithful service to URISA and have participated in its programs over a period of several years. The award is for service in a number of programs or committees, and a willingness to take on challenges without regard to the potential for recognition. Michael Lovett and Lynda Wayne, GISP are both recipients of a 2007 URISA Service Award.

Michael W. Lovett, Senior Project Manager – Lead Practitioner, Camp Dresser & McKee Inc.
Mike Lovett has over 38 years of public and private sector experience in information management systems (IMS) for GIS, land surveying, aerial photography, photogrammetry, and engineering. He was a team member on the first AM/FM project conducted within the United States. Mr. Lovett’s management of digital mapping and AM/FM/GIS activities have involved both domestic and international projects on numerous platforms. Mr. Lovett is currently providing consulting services for strategic information plans, information systems integration, database design, web-based applications, data conversion and other GIS implementations.

Mike has been an active URISA Workshop Development Committee member since 2004 and has been Workshop Development Chair since 2005. He was instrumental in developing and improving the annual peer review process for workshops. He is also a Certified Instructor for URISA’s GIS Program Management Workshop. Mike is a very engaged member of URISA’s Leadership Academy committee; he’s served on the annual conference committee and is the Program Co-Chair of this conference. In 2005-6, Mike served on the Chapter Relations Committee and he was a participant at the 2005 URISA Visioning Session. Mike is extremely active at the local level, serving in leadership roles for the Florida URISA Chapter for a number of years. He began his leadership role in FLURISA as the East Central Region Director and he also served as secretary, vice president and recently completed 2 years as president. He is currently serving as Past President of the Chapter.

Lynda Wayne, GISP
Lynda Wayne is Principal of GeoMaxim, a GIS and geospatial data management practice. She provides metadata and training support to the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) and National Spatial Data Infrastructure Stakeholders. She is the former Director of the Louisiana Geographic Information Center at Louisiana State University (LSU) and served as a Research Scientist with the LSU Coastal Studies Institute specializing in the application of GIS and Remote Sensing to coastal landscape ecology.

Lynda was a key member of the URISA Certification Committee from 2000-2004, which developed the GIS professional certification program over an intensive four-year period. She then served on the GIS Certification Institute’s Board of Directors from 2003-2007 and was GISCI President from 2004-2007. Lynda has presented at dozens of URISA conferences and events. She won the URISA Service Award at the 2003 annual conference as part of the Certification Committee and she co-authored “Frameworks and Strategies for Integrating Metadata Concepts with Geographic Information Science Curricula” URISA Journal Article Volume 15, Number 1.

Barbara Hirsch Special Service Award
Presented to members or staff who have made special contributions to URISA. This award was created to honor URISA’s former Chief Financial Officer, Barbara Hirsch. The award will be given to individuals or committees who have shown a similar consummate level of service to URISA through an ongoing commitment to our success as an organization.

The 2007 Barbara Hirsch Special Service Award is awarded to Allen Ibaugh, GISP. Allen is the CEO of Data Transfer Solutions and leads DTS’s transportation and asset management vertical markets for federal, state, regional, local, and private clients. He received a BS in Psychology and BA in Geography from Indiana University in 1992. In 1995 he graduated with a MS in Urban and Regional Planning and MA in Geography from the University of Iowa with a concentration in Transportation Studies.

Allen first joined URISA as a student member and has been an active volunteer in many capacities. He has been involved in the annual conference committee for a number of years and was Conference Chair for the 2004 event in Reno. Allen concludes his three-year term as a member of the URISA Board of Directors at this conference. He has served as URISA’s Treasurer during this time and accomplished much in this position, bringing more focus to the organization’s financial reporting and analysis. It’s very appropriate that Allen receives the Barbara Hirsch Special Service Award, as it was named for URISA’s former CFO.

For more information, contact URISA at 847/824-6300

Wendy Nelson
Executive Director
URISA
wnelson@urisa.org
www.urisa.org
847-824-6300