Updated data management system changes way Corps manages aquatic environment  

The new data management system will help the Corps track permit applications for construction activities that occur in the nation's waters, including wetlands. (Photo by Anthony Bley)

Jun. 26, 2007

By Jon Soderberg
USACE Headquarters

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plays a key role in managing the nation's waters and regulates many types of work associated with them.  In recent years Supreme Court rulings have changed aspects of the way the Corps administers the Clean Water Act.  To respond to these changes and an increasing permitting work load, the Corps' regulatory program has made a major leap forward by upgrading its data management systems. 

For more than 30 years, each of the 38 Corps Districts' Regulatory Programs independently tracked basic data concerning the number of permits issued and the total impacts to waters of the United States.  Data was collected and managed locally and reported only on a quarterly basis.  In late 2003, the Regulatory Program introduced ORM, an acronym for the "Operation and Maintenance Information Business Link Regulatory Module." With several years of flat lined budgets, advances in technology, and the growing needs of the regulatory program, the Corps decided to upgrade ORM to keep up with the changing laws and needs of the Corps and the public.

"The development of ORM 2 will be a defining moment for environmental programs across the entire Corps," said Mark Sudol, acting chief of Operations.

ORM 2, a web-based application with a fully integrated geographic information system, will expand the way the regulatory program can be managed.  The ORM 2 system will track the permit actions by a physical location on the landscape and all the aquatic resources at that location, whether or not impacts are authorized at that location.  Regulators are provided a suite of tools to assist in the data entry process.  From geo-coding of addresses like most navigation software to standard formatted letter generation, the system takes advantage of many of the common web-based tools people now use.  The ORM 2 system streamlines or eliminates data entry headaches.

"ORM 2 was developed to complement and coordinate with Enterprise Geographic Information System (EGIS) programs and incorporate data from widely disparate sources," Sudol said.  "At a minimum, it will greatly improve communication across all Corps programs as we enter and share spatial data on our projects, reservoirs, real estate holdings, navigation facilities and permits.  In the future, as we share technical data with local governments and provide technical assistance to watershed groups, ORM 2 will be one facet of the Corps' re-emergence as a leader in integrated water resources and a key player in watershed management."

"To ensure that the strides made in the past three years not only continue but increase, we will start today to lay the foundation to ensure that all wetlands decision-makers, inside and outside the federal government, have real-time access to the information they need to make enlightened decisions," said James L. Connaughton, Council on Environmental Quality chairman, in a letter to Congress transmitting "Conserving America's Wetlands 2007:  Three Years of Progress Implementing the President's Goal."

ORM 2 changes the way the regulatory program looks at, manages and tracks the aquatic environment. Local data systems only tracked the permit and the impact of that permit with no long-term monitoring of what was occurring on the ground. The

ORM 2 system tracks the legacy of the aquatic resource the Corps is regulating.  Unlike its predecessors, ORM 2 is built so upgrades can be made easily.

For additional information on ORM 2 contact Jon Soderberg at jon.e.soderberg@usace.army.mil.