Minutes of the 62nd Quarterly Salt Lake GIS Users Group (SLUG) meeting, held on August 20, 2025 from 11:30 am to 1:00 at the Utah Department of Natural Resources (1594 W North Temple, Salt Lake City, UT 84114). There were about 85 people in attendance today.
Business
Lindsy Hales Bently, SLUG Board
Welcome to SLUG’s 62nd meeting! We would like to thank the DNR for hosting and UGIC sponsoring this meeting and providing lunch! If you haven't already, please join our SLUG LinkedIn group here.
We are looking for presenters and panelists for our SLUG GIS day happening on November 19th. Please use this form to sign up and let us know if you have any questions.
Stan McShinsky, UGIC Board
A location has been picked for the 2026 UGIC conference: Kanab! There is a new conference center being built and that's where the conference will be held. More information to come soon!
Presentations
Brent Mitchell, RedCastle Resources, ASKTERRA: Translating Natural Language Prompts into Spatial Intelligence
ASKTERRA is a conversational GeoAI platform that allows users to explore Earth’s changing landscapes through natural language, combining near real-time change detection (1984 to present) with Sentinel and Landsat data on Google Earth Engine, and 10-day risk and weather forecasting models. Designed for both GIS professionals and decision-makers, it delivers rapid, cloud-free composites and clear answers in minutes while removing coding barriers, streamlining collaboration, and freeing analysts for deeper work. Backed by 28 years of geospatial expertise and leveraging cloud services, GEE, and LLMs, ASKTERRA provides map outputs, explanations, citations, and downloadable data products that can be easily shared across teams. Version 1 launches in early September with a focus on two-day change detection, with future versions set to expand capabilities. Check out ASKTERRA here.
Maevlyn Stevens, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, DWR's Wildlife Habitat Analysis Tool
The Wildlife Habitat Analysis Tool was developed to support NEPA reviews, permitting, and conservation planning by standardizing over a century of diverse wildlife data into one format. It provides a map interface that integrates public and protected species data, allowing users to upload their own datasets and generate PDF reports. The tool incorporates a wide range of reference layers—such as agriculture, aquatics, energy, habitat, hydrology, land ownership, migration corridors, and water rights—and continues to expand through user feedback and new data additions. By streamlining access to critical environmental information, it helps agencies, stakeholders, and the public evaluate impacts, develop mitigation strategies, and make informed decisions, with future enhancements planned to further improve functionality. To get more information on this tool here.
GIS Humor
James Burton - SLUG Board
Check out some GIS memes that James found!
Our next meeting will be November 19th at SLCC Taylorsville Redwood Campus for a special GIS Day meeting, keep an eye out for more information on that.
Thank you to our presenters and for joining us in person. If you have any ideas for a presentation or any other matter, please contact a SLUG board member. We welcome short or long presentations on any projects that you might be working on that might benefit others. If you have any contacts that would be willing to ‘sponsor’ a lunch by providing food/drinks in exchange for their advertising at the meeting, contact a SLUG Board member.
We appreciate your interest and support!
Check out our website for updates, contact info, or to sign up for our newsletter to get job announcements and SLUG meeting announcement emails.