The Pennsylvania State Data Center invites you to attend our Annual Data User Conference scheduled for September 14, 2006 at the Holiday Inn Harrisburg/Hershey! This year’s conference theme is of concern to both governmental and private agencies: How Safe is Pennsylvania? Speakers will focus on how the state, communities, and the private sector are using data for planning and emergency preparedness.

Keynote Speaker

Dr. Sam Stebbins
Prinicipal Investigator/Director, Center for Public Health Preparedness
Assistant Professor
University of Pittsburgh

Dr. Stebbins will describe and discuss how information and data can be utilized to help mitigate and improve respond to an on-going disaster or outbreak, with the ultimate result of improving safety and saving lives.

Dr. Stebbins is the Director of the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Public Health Preparedness (UPCPHP). UPCPHP trains public health and related professionals to respond to bioterrorism, infectious disease outbreaks, and other public health threats and emergencies. Their portal provides frontline public health and health care workers with access to national and local preparedness and response information and public health competency-based training resources.

Plenary Speaker

Gerald Mcateer
PEIRS Program Manager
Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA)

Mr. Mcateer will discuss how the Pennsylvania Emergency Incident Reporting System (PEIRS) and Initial Damage Reporter (IDR) impact disaster management, from the collection and storage of near real time information to the data exchange between legacy incident management systems and newly developed emergency notification and alerting systems. He will also discuss how these tools assist local government, state executive staff, and the emergency community in their efforts to adequately respond to, recover from, and mitigate a disaster.

The day will include multiple breakout sessions covering a variety of topics, including the Pennsylvania Quality of Life Study: Public Concerns about Preparedness, PA Homeland Security/Public Safety Geospatial Portal Applications, Public Health Preparedness, School Violence Data, Crime Statistics, Immigration, Economic and Workforce Development Data, Transitioning to the American Community Survey, and more. For a complete list and description of topics visit the schedule and sessions pages of this site.

Registration with a continental breakfast will begin at 8:00 a.m. Exhibitors will have informative displays for viewing during registration and all session breaks.

Please take a look at our conference brochure!