Communique #7
Dear All
We have recently had confirmation from the Commonwealth that our extensive suite of contracts that we all worked on for the establishment of our new CRCSI have been approved by the Commonwealth and their funding of us can now commence!
In other developments…
1] GOVERNANCE
The Steering Committee of CRCSI-2 are meeting regularly. It is guiding the process that will lead to the establishment of the first Board. The process has involved seeking nominations for candidate Directors from the Colleges of members, consistent with a list of skills needed for the Board. This process is now well underway. It is expected that the new Board will be in place in the next couple of months. The Steering Committee will continue to provide oversight of the CRCSI until the new Board is in place. The Steering Committee will then be disbanded.
2] POSITIONS
Recruitment for the following positions is underway:
- The CRCSI Research Director – this position has gone from being part-time in the old CRCSI to full-time in the new and as such it was felt appropriate to advertise it.
- The CRCSI (NZ node) Director of Operations – to be based in New Zealand and hosted by Land Information New Zealand. This is a new position that reflects the growing importance of New Zealand.
- Finance Manager Samantha Bain has moved to a part time appointment and following a competitive recruitment process we welcome Nicola Hart who will be job sharing the role with Samantha.
All positions advertised or appointed will be noted in the news section of the CRCSI website www.crcsi.com.au
3] ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2010
The CRCSI Annual Conference will be held in Melbourne on 23 and 24 November. These dates were chosen to take into account the timing of other spatial events and the need to maximise benefit of attendees. In past years conference attendance has been exclusively for employees of members of the CRCSI. It is likely that this practice will continue.
4] Australian Space Activities Survey
For the first time in 14 years the Federal Government has decided to take an active role in space. The Federal Government has allocated $40 million in seed funding for space research projects and $8.6 million over 4 years to form the Space Policy Unit (SPU) within the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (DIISR) to coordinate Australia’s Federal Space Activities. The SPU is tasked with developing a National Space Policy and is seeking information about the size and current activities of Australia’s space sector. They have engaged Asia Pacific Aerospace Consultants Pty. Ltd. (APAC) to identify Australia’s current space activities and conduct an economic assessment of the current value of space to the Australian community and associated trends as input to the National Space Policy development.
“Current space activities” includes the use of space derived data in products and services. The spatial information industry is heavily involved in these space activities and this is your opportunity to make a contribution towards informing future Australian space policy. APAC has prepared a survey to collect your information at www.surveymonkey.com/s/Australian_Space_Activites_Survey The survey takes 15-20 minutes to complete.
