Barton County Cartographer BJ Wooding has received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Kansas Association of Mappers. She has worked for the county for 23 years.
Wooding handles all of the mapping and GIS (geographic information systems) for the appraiser’s office and other county offices. Some of the information can be accessed on the Barton County website, BartonCounty.org. (Go to “departments” and click on the “mapping” tab.)
Wooding worked in the oil business in Houston before consulting a career counselor. Testing suggested she might do well as a meteorologist or as a cartographer. After earning a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts from the University of Kansas, she enrolled at the University of Wisconsin and began working on a master’s in cartography. However, she stopped working on the advanced degree when she was hired to by Barton County in January of 1990.
Statewide reappraisals had taken place in 1988 and 1989, and the law required parcel mapping. Cartography was supervised by the appraiser’s office, but is now under the administrator’s office, as work has expanded to other departments.
An active member of the Kansas Association of Mappers, Wooding is a past president and currently a director. She is a past winner of its Prestigious Cartographer Award and has earned two professional designations.
Gov. Sam Brownback has appointed Wooding to the state’s GIS Policy Board. She has been appointed to that board by every Kansas governor since and including Bill Graves.