Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 31, Number 9, 1 September 2014 — Innovative use of technology earns OHA a geographic information system award [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Innovative use of technology earns OHA a geographic information system award

By Zach Villanueva The Office of Hawaiian Affairs Research Program has been recognized for its

work in geographic information systems by a global leader in mapping technologies. The Special Achievement in GIS Award from the Environmental Systems Research Institute was presented at the 2014 Esri International User Conference in San Diego in July. With more than 100,000 organizations using Esri GIS products, only around 170 users are selected

by ESRI President Jack Dangermond to receive the award eaeh year. OHA caught the eye of ESRI staff because of its unique use of mapping technology,

whieh enables the eommunity to take an interactive look at Hawai'i's landscape through wahi inoa, or plaee names. OHA's eultural use of GIS technology allows the user to view maps of Hawai'i as a traditional land system, where mokupuni (islands) are divided into moku (districts) and ahupua'a (land divisions extending from upland to the sea). The Office of Hawaiian Affairs'

Zack Smith and Kamoa Quiteves gave a presentation at the conferenee, and explained the new ways OHA would be using GIS software through its Klpuka database. "This year we went and presented because we're in the middle of testing out the participatory part of our database," said Quiteves, OHA's

land, culture and history manager. "You (the user) are now allowed to input data into it. Let's just say you found a historic site, there was an ahu (altar) or heiau (shrine) and nobody knew it was there, now you ean add features and data." Quiteves says that inputting data on Native Hawaiian land use ean be

a daunting challenge for him and his staff, whieh is why he hopes that this new feature will allow the people to tell their stories of places important to them. "For a description of an ahupua'a, I could read through several books and give a niee description, but I thought it would be more appropriate if people from their own communities eame up with those descriptions," he said. This new feature on kipuka database.com will allow people to maximize the use of the latest mapping technologies, but more importantly, it gives people a plaee to share their mo'olelo (stories) about the land, whieh might have been missed in years past. "If the information is excellent and we review it, then we just press a button that populates it into our database," Quitevis said. To learn more, visit kipuka database.com. ■

Zach Villanueva is a student helper in OHA's Communications Program.

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Zack Smith, left, and Kamoa Quitevis, right, accepted a Special Achievement in GIS Award from Environmental Systems Research lnstitute President Jack Dangermond, center, at the Esri lnternational User Conference in July. - Courtesy: Esri