Development of a GIS template to assist forest stewardship planning and reporting for the Northeast (New York)

Under the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service's Forest Stewardship Program, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) has committed itself to the task of keeping private forestlands intact and healthy. This document details the creation of the Forest Stewardship Automated Data Entry System (FSADES) for the NYSDEC field foresters to make recording and reporting Stewardship activities more efficient and standardized. FSADES is an extension for the ArcView™ 3.x Geographic Information System (GIS). The extension is a self-explanatory user interface allowing for the creation of data in a guided format. FSADES was demonstrated to sample NYSDEC audiences and questionnaire feedback was used to enhance the program. Once the program was near completion, a usability test was conducted with NYSDEC volunteers. Comments and suggestions from questionnaires associated with the test were used to make modifications to the software before the final version was released.