NMCRIS FAQs

The locational data (county, USGS quad, PLSS) for activities and resources are derived from the GIS and automatically populated into the appropriate online forms. Submitting GIS shapes for surveyed space and resource boundaries is therefore a critical part of the registration process. Please complete this step as soon as possible after you have received your NMCRIS, LA, and HCPI numbers. The fields in the NIAF relating to location (county, USGS quad, PLSS) are automatically populated from this step by a spatial intersect. Neglecting this important step will result in blank fields and could delay approval of your project by review agencies.

Please use proper case sensitivity when making entries in the Title or Report field. Capitalize where appropriate (except for pronouns and indefinite articles). For Author(s): express as last name, first name (e.g., Doe, John). For reports with multiple authors, express the first author as last name, first name, and additional authors as first name, last name (e.g., Doe, John, Linda Moose, Joshua Elk).

NMCRIS coordinate system

As part of the 2010–2011 upgrades to NMCRIS, all coordinate data were migrated to NAD-83 UTM. Please be aware of the Zone 12/Zone 13 issue affecting statewide data in New Mexico. The map service is projected into NAD-83 UTM Zone 13 across the entire state. However, the activity and resource summary reports will display Zone 12 coordinates where appropriate. For example, the resource summary report (PDF) for the Silver City Historic District lists the centerpoint coordinates as UTM Zone 12 755004 E, 3629401 N. However, if a user hovers the mouse over the Silver City Historic District the dynamic coordinates at the bottom of the screen will read 192968, 3630875. This latter coordinate pair represents the projected Zone 13 coordinates.

Uploading spatial data to NMCRIS

The NMCRIS map service gives users the ability to upload activity and resource polygons. Please note that this data must be in the NAD-83 UTM Zone 13 projection. This requirement holds even for projects located in the "Zone 12" part of the state.

1. If a user attempts to upload a shapefile in any projection other than NAD-83 UTM Zone 13 the upload will fail (the system validates the .prj file behind the scenes).
2. When using the "Enter XY values" tool to manually enter vertex coordinates, be certain that the coordinate values reflect the NAD-83 UTM Zone 13 projection. If field collected data are in another coordinate system it will be necessary to reproject the coordinate values. Note: this does not require the purchase of expensive GIS software. A number of free utilities for converting coordinate data from one projection to another are available over the internet.
3. The old-school method of heads-up digitizing by picking points against the underlying topo map or aerial photo ("eye-balling") is not affected by the datum shift. This method may be employed exactly as it was done in the past.

If you want dynamic UTM coordinate readouts in the Map Service and do not see them in the lower left-hand corner of your browser, follow these steps to turn on this feature:

For Microsoft Internet Explorer (MSIE)

1. Go to Internet Options in MSIE. Click Tools, Internet Options. You can click the Tools menu item or the little "cog wheel" icon.
2. Click the Security tab. Click Trusted Sites.
3. Drag the security level bar to "Low," and click "Apply." If you get any warnings saying this setting will compromise your browser security, dismiss them.
4. Click the "Sites" button (to the lower right of the white pane at the top of the window).
5. Under "Add this website to the zone," make sure https://nmcris.dca.state.nm.us is in that field, and click Add. Make sure that this web address appears under the Websites list below.
6. Click Close. Click OK.
7. Restart MSIE. Verify that the dynamic coordinate readout shows in the lower left-hand corner after you've accessed the GIS.
8. If you don't see the dynamic readout, make sure your status bar is turned on. Go to the menu area at the top of the browser, right click, and select Status Bar so that it's checked. You should see the readout turn on at the lower left of the screen.

For Firefox

Newer versions of Firefox no longer have a status bar built in, so you'll have to install an extension to view the coordinate readout.

1. Go to Tools, Options. You can click the Tools menu item or the Firefox item in the upper left-hand corner.
2. Click Content. Make sure Enable JavaScript is checked.
3. Go to Tools, Add-ons (or press Ctrl+Shift+A). The Add-ons tab will open.
4. Under Search, search for "Status-4-Evar." Click "Install" to the right once the extension comes up.
5. Restart Firefox and go to the Add-ons tab again. Select Options for Status-4-Evar. Under the General tab select "Allow Webpages to Change the Status." Click OK.
6. Launch the GIS and verify that the dynamic coordinates are showing in the lower left-hand corner of the screen. If they aren't, relaunch the browser and check again.

Note: These instructions have not been tested for every possible combination of browser and operating system. In general, they will work for any of the newer browser versions combined with Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7. If you're having trouble with this or using a different browser, the basic idea is to enable JavaScript, set the security settings for https://nmcris.dca.state.nm.us to as low as possible, and make sure the status bar is displayed.