General Information

The Tennessee Geographic Council was established in 1994 to improve the linkages between the various agencies working with GIS in Tennessee. At present, there are over 200 members representing many varied agencies. Tennessee Geographic Information Council (TNGIC) is a non-profit group of Geographic Information System users, designers and those who influence the use of GIS in federal state and local governments as well as private sector representatives within the State of Tennessee.

The Council had it's beginnings as an ad hoc group of mainly natural resources practitioners in state government interested in sharing spatial data. This core group sponsored the first TNGIC User's Forum in December 1993. The 220 attendees to this organizational meeting ranged from long time practitioners to puzzled city managers, all of whom were interested in this emerging technology and developing uses to serve the people of the State of Tennessee. Student involvement is strongly encouraged. TNGIC maintains an associate membership with URISA.

TNGIC holds quarterly board meetings and an annual general membership meeting in March. The annual meeting includes panel discussions, workshops, vendor displays and poster displays. Other channels for communication among GIS professionals across the state are the quarterly newsletter and the TNGIC list server is available for questions, announcements and discussion..

Click here for a breakdown of the TNGIC membership.

A quarterly newsletter is published. See the main page's table of contents for a link to the newsletter. The newsletter is published under the direction of the Secretary. The Secretary can either publish the newsletter or appoint someone to publish the newsletter.

When TNGIC was established, a system of bylaws was adopted to govern the management and organization of TNGIC operation. All aspects of purpose, membership, meetings, officers, etc are covered by these bylaws.