1. ICT Technical Documentation and Flow Chart
Prepared by Frank LaFone (WVGISTC) on December 2016
The WV Interagency Cooperation Tool is designed to streamline a manual process for assessing the impact NRCS practices have upon federally protected rare and endangered species. The application provides a mechanism for users to digitize their area of interest, input the desired approved NRCS practices, and submit that information for analysis. Once submitted, the application first compares the inputted geometry to the known and modeled location of rare and endangered species. Intersections between the two cause the system to look up recommended mitigation techniques and practices and compile them. Those compiled techniques are then processed into a report which is made available to the user in electronic form. This report is subsequently used in NRCS business processes to provide critical documentation as to the impact on protected resources.
The application uses a three stage architecture to accomplish these goals. These stages are designed to minimize user needs while protecting sensitive data and providing consistent and reliable results. Stage one provides the user with a digitizing and annotation method to input the study area of interest into the system. The user input method uses standard Internet mapping/GIS approaches to displaying and digitizing geographic information to users over the Web. Users simply draw upon the map and answer a few standard web form inputs. That information is then fed back to the server for stage two processing.

2. Stage two happens on the hosted sever and is inaccessible to users or the general Internet. The server runs a custom created geoprocessing service built using industry standard ArcGIS application programming interfaces. The script interests the input geometry with known and modeled locations of rare and endangered species location. These locations are provided by the US Fish & Wildlife Service in consultation with the WV Division of Natural Resources (DNR). These two groups work to provide the exact locations and models for species locations for the system. They are taken as given and not altered in any form. Exact species locations are housed in vector based formats while the models are housed in raster grid cells. Stage two features three sub-stages. In sub-stage A, vector locations of species are buffered to the extent provided by the US Fish & Wildlife. Raster species are similarly buffered. In sub-stage B, the script loops through all species and buffers the user inputted geometry by an amount specified in the tables given by the US Fish & Wildlife and WV DNR. The script then tests for intersection between the buffered species and the buffered user input. If there is an interaction effect, it is noted. Sub-stage C then loops through those found user input/species interactions and creates a table within a database of recommended actions to mitigate effects between species for the given user geometry and NRCS practices. These mitigation activities are created by the NRCS in consultation with the US Fish & Wildlife and stored within a lookup table. The script triggers stage three of the application once all recommendations are discovered for each species/practice interaction found in the script.
Stage three creates the necessary report in pdf format for the end user to view at a later date. The report follows a format as specified by the NRCS in order to conform with their program goals and required outcomes.

3. Stage three creates the necessary report in pdf format for the end user to view at a later date. The report follows a format as specified by the NRCS in order to conform with their program goals and required outcomes. Stage three loops through the table of recommendations and consults a code/textual description lookup table to generate the report. The report features some metadata information about the client, such as client name, date, etc. After the metadata, the report details the recommendations for practices and mitigation strategies suggested to the client. This report is then stored within the user manage system so the user can refer to the pdf at any point in the future. The final step of this stage is to notify the end user the report is ready for viewing.

4. Additional, non processing functions
LEGEND
Output
Subroutine
Inputs
Conditional
Additional, non processing functions
Loop

5. Online Map Display Reference layers Collect User Inputs
Streets
Waterways
Contours
Display Species Reference layers
Golden Wing Warbler
Bald Eagle Nesting Sites
(only points with no associated data)
Collect User Inputs
(see next chart)
Submit User Input to Geoprocessing Script

6. Online Map Inputs Digitized polygon Practices
Practice number – from NRCS approved practice list
Metric number – number
Metric measurement type – acres, feet, number
Client description
Name
Farm name
Descriptive location
User information

7. Report Type (NLAA, NE, or NS)
Collect Metadata
Polygon Test
Point Test
Raster Test
17 Acre Test
(For Indiana Bat)
Report Type (NLAA, NE, or NS)
Create Report

8. Collect Metadata Map Inputs Save metadata in MySQL Report Table
Calculate current time/date
Calculate Centroid of polygon
(ArcPy – featureToPoint tool)
Calculate County(s) of polygon
Calculate acres of polygon
Store in Variable
Store in Variable
Store in Variable
Store in Variable
Save metadata in MySQL Report Table

9. Polygon Test Passed Species Array (remove duplicates) Map Inputs Yes
Get User Input Practice
Get Species
Calculate buffer of user input polygon
Calculate buffer overlays of species and input polygon buffer
Does species Buffer and input polygon buffer intersect?
Get Species/Practice Buffer Value
(from SpeciesPracticeProximity Table)
Buffer Species Geometry (ArcPy.buffer_analysis)
Yes No
Passed Species Array
(remove duplicates)
Add to passed species array
Do nothing

10. Point Test Passed Species Array (remove duplicates) Map Inputs Yes No
Get User Input Practice
Get Species
Calculate buffer of user input polygon
Calculate buffer overlays of species and input polygon buffer
Does species Buffer and input polygon buffer intersect?
Get Species/Practice Buffer Value
(from SpeciesPracticeProximity Table)
Buffer Species Geometry (ArcPy.buffer_analysis)
Yes No
Passed Species Array
(remove duplicates)
Add to passed species array
Do nothing

11. Raster Test Passed Species Array (remove duplicates) Map Inputs Yes No
Get User Input Practice
Get Species
Calculate buffer of user input polygon
Calculate buffer overlays of species and input polygon buffer
Does zonal statistics exceeds model threshold?
Get Species/Practice Model Threshold
(from SpeciesPracticeProximity Table)
Zonal Statistics based upon pixel and model threshold
(from SpeciesPracticeProximity Table)
Yes No
Passed Species Array
(remove duplicates)
Add to passed species array
Do nothing

12. Optional 17 Acre Test Passed Species Array (remove duplicates)
(For Indiana Bat)
Map Inputs
(practices)
Known bat practices
(hard coded)
Is number of acres > 17?
Get number of acres from metadata
Passed Species Array
(remove duplicates)
Yes No
Add all bats to species array
Do nothing

13. Report Generation NLAA = Not Likely To Adversely Affect NE = No Effect
Which Report to write?
NLAA = Not Likely To Adversely Affect
NE = No Effect
NS = No Species
Species found
No Species found
Practices have affect on species and/or habitat
Practices have NO affect on species and/or habitat
Write NLAA Report
Write NE Report
Write NS Report

14. NLAA Report Generation
Get Species from Pass Species Array
MySQL Report Table
Look Up Code for Species and Practice
(from speciesPracticeRec Table)

15. Get Species from Species Array
NE Report Generation
Get Species from Species Array
MySQL Report Table

16. Write No Species Found to
NS Report Generation
Write No Species Found to
MySQL Report Table