Fed architecture to cover records, maybe geospatial info

Records management and possibly a geospatial data layer will be added to the federal enterprise architecture, said Kim Nelson, chief information officer at the Environmental Protection Agency and co-chairwoman of the CIO Council's Architecture and Infrastructure Committee.

The overlays are policy documents that affect all five of the federal enterprise architecture's data reference models. A security and privacy overlay was made public earlier this fall and is undergoing revision, said Nelson, who spoke Nov. 10 at the GCN Enterprise Architecture Conference in Washington, D.C.

The records profile will take work done at the National Archives and Records Administration and apply it across the entire federal enterprise architecture, she said.

Nothing official has been decided about a geospatial overlay, Nelson said. Talks with Office of Management Budget officials have not taken place, but "it's something that with my role and my leadership, I would like to see happen," she added.

Responses from other federal officials indicate that the federal architecture must have a way to make sure that agencies' geospatial data can support Web services and be exchanged among their systems, Nelson said.

The recent addition of geospatial information officers at major agencies such as the EPA and the Homeland Security Department highlight growing awareness of the importance of geospatial data, she said. "More and more, you will see agencies creating these positions," she said.