GCR Inc.

CASE STUDY

Facility and Agreement Management System:
GIS Module
Catholic Mutual Group

A GIS module that accesses US Census data is GCR’s latest enhancement to the comprehensive facility and agreement management application that we developed for the Catholic Mutual Group (CMG) of Omaha.

This comprehensive database application was designed to assist Catholic dioceses in the management of Church-owned properties, tracking such information as location, structural details, maintenance and repair costs, leases, mineral rights, contact individuals, and much more.

With the addition of data garnered from the year 2000 Census, planners in a diocese can now draw on information showing demographic trends and statistics in planning for the maintenance and disposition of Church-owned properties. Issues such as the aging population, the influx of ethnic immigrant groups, or the makeup of a given area in terms of race, median income, or education levels can be displayed graphically or in written format to support decisions for the planning of new parishes and schools or the closing of old ones, or for the strategic placement of nursing homes, hospitals, community and day-care centers, or other social service institutions run by Church agencies.

Census data is normally presented just the way it is collected—by census blocks, the smallest unit defined, and block groups, the next larger unit, which consists of a number of census blocks. For their purposes, diocese planners are interested in areas defined by parish and diocese boundaries, which rarely if ever correspond exactly with the Census units. As an added feature, GCR can add a map layer which overlays the actual parish and diocese boundaries on the census blocks and block groups, as shown in this example.

Where overlap occurs, the statistical information is distributed proportionately. For example, if a census block straddles the boundary of three parishes so that 47% of it lies in one parish, 38% in another, and the remaining 15% in a third, the Map It! function automatically makes the calculations that allow users to see the relevant information by actual parish or diocese.