Identification_Information:
 Citation:
  Citation_Information:
   Originator: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency/Office of Water/OST
   Publication_Date: 19980227
   Title: Counties and County Equivalents Boundaries in the United States for BASINS
   Publication_Information
      Publication_Place: Washington DC
      Publisher: US EPA
   Online_Linkage: http://www.epa.gov/waterscience/basins/

 Description:
  Abstract:

   This coverage is of the county boundaries of the conterminous United
   States.  It was derived from the U.S. Geological Survey State Boundaries,
   which were derived from Digital Line Graph (DLG) files representing the
   1:2,000,000-scale map in the National Atlas of the United States.

  Purpose:

   This coverage is intended as a basemap for a variety of applications.

  Supplemental_Information:

   Limitations_of_Data:
   The original files for this map were provided in 15 sections.
   Boundaries near the edges of sections have been adjusted in
   edgematching.


   Procedures:
   The BASINS data product was derived from the U.S. Geological Survey
   COUNTIES2M layer.  The USGS procedures for that data product are followed
   by the BASINS procedures:

   This series of maps was published as part of the National Atlas of
   the United States (USGS, 1970).  The maps for the conterminous
   United States were digitized in 15 sheets and published in the
   Digital Line Graph (DLG) format as described by Domeratz and others
   (1983).

   Each sheet was prepared by reading the DLG files of the political
   and water bodies layers, converting them to ARC/INFO, extracting
   the county boundaries and the coastline, respectively, and joining
   the two layers together.  FIPS codes were assigned to all polygons
   using available sources, and were checked manually.

   Boundaries with adjacent sheets of the 15-sheet set were
   edgematched manually, arbitrarily choosing one of the sheets as the
   "correct" border.  Edgematching operations adjusted the linework as
   far as was necessary so that the coverages would fit to a tolerance
   of 100 meters.  The coverage (referred to herein as Version 1.0)
   was stored as 49 separate coverages (48 states and the District of
   Columbia) because the ARC/INFO software in use at the time could
   not process the entire coverage.  Individual states could be joined
   by specifying a tolerance of 100 meters.

   From time to time, adjustments were made to the state coverages to
   reflect changes in U.S. counties.  It is believed the accuracy of
   these adjustments is comparable to the original linework.

   For Version 2.0, all state coverages were rejoined and manually
   edited to produce a perfect edgematch between all states.  For
   states on the original map sheet boundaries, this adjustment
   averaged less than 20 meters and in no case was more than 100
   meters.  The whole coverage was CLEANed to a tolerance of 20
   meters, which resulted in few, if any, effects on small offshore
   islands. The coverage also was checked to ensure that it
   represented current U.S. counties or county equivalents.

   The coverage in Version 1.0 stopped at the coastline.  There was no
   attempt to depict offshore areas.  The created some problems when
   the coverage was used to assign county codes to sampling stations
   located near the coast.  To help in this matter, Version 2.o
   includes offshore extensions of the county polygons.  The (water)
   boundaries of many of these polygons are arbitrary.

   The Canadian Great Lakes features are another new addition to
   Version 2.0.  They were added to improve the utility of the
   coverage for visual displays.  Although the Canadian Great Lakes
   are logically represented by a single polygon, practical
   considerations -- the inability of some software to plot polygons
   with a large number of vertices -- made it necessary to separate
   them into 4 polygons.  The dividing lines are located in narrow
   channels to minimize interference with plotting patterns.  Canadian
   islands within the Great Lakes also were included.

   All tics were relocated to places that are easily visible on maps
   of the United States, to help in registering maps that may not
   otherwise have adequate registration information.

   To expedite accessing parts of the coverage, certain items have
   been indexed with the procedure, index_county.aml.  See Section 3
   above.  A spatial index also was created.

   When using this coverage to clip or intersect other coverages, a
   tolerance as low as 2 meters can be used.

   The processing used to derive this coverage moved boundaries from
   their positions on the original maps.  In cases of conflicting
   lines, preference was given to forming the correct topology.
   Strictly speaking, this coverage is not identical to the source
   materials.  These changes were unavoidable in producing a
   continuous coverage of the conterminous United States.

   For revision 2.1, it was necessary to alter about 100 arcs.  This
   was accomplished with ARCEDIT using the 1:100,000 TIGER county
   coverage as a background.  These arcs were matched to the background
   so that they matched at least as close as other arcs that were not
   edited.

   For distribution with BASINS v1.0, the national coverage was split into
   a series of coverages that included the spatial extent of each of the nine
   US EPA regions, plus the hydrologic accounting units that crossed Region
   boundaries.  The nine regional coverages therefore overlapped at
   Regional boundaries.  The coverages were distributed in PC ARC/INFO
   coverage format.

   For distribution with Basins v2.0, the PA ARC/INFO coverages were exported
   on a PC then imported in  workstation ARC/INFO v7.0.4.  Each Regional coverage
   was then projected to geographic decimal degrees, NAD83.  The coverages
   were then converted to ESRI Shapefile format, using the ARCSHAPE command.


   Reviews_Applied:
   This coverage has received no formal review.  It has, however, been
   used in numerous applications where serious errors would have been
   obvious.  Some county coverages were corrected following such use.
   The offshore polygon extensions and the Canadian Great Lakes
   polygons have had no review.

   BASINS v2.0 reviews: projected coverages were checked for topology. The
   shapefile format features and attributes were visually inspected and
   compared with the BASINS v1.0 PC ARC/INFO coverages.


   Other_Related_Data_Sets:
   This coverage was derived from USGS 1:2,000,000-scale basemaps
   covering the United States. 

   References_Cited:

   Negri, M.  Digital map of state boundaries of the conterminous
   United States.  1994.  U.S. Geological Survey, digital map.

   Domeratz, M. A., Hallam, C. A., Schmidt, W. E., and Calkins, H. W.,
   1983.  USGS Digital Cartographic Data Standards: Digital Line
   Graphs from 1:2,000,000-scale Maps.  U.S. Geological Survey
   Circular 895-D, 38p.

   U. S. Geological Survey, 1970.  National atlas of the United States
   of America: Washington D.C., U. S. Geological Survey, 417p.


 Time_Period_of_Content:
    Time_Period_Information:
      Single_Date/Time:
       Calendar_Date: 1994
    Currentness_Reference: publication date

 Status:
    Progress: Complete
    Maintenance_and_Update_Frequency: None planned

 Spatial_Domain:
    Bounding_Coordinates:
      West_Bounding_Coordinate: -125.0000
      East_Bounding_Coordinate: -66.0000
      North_Bounding_Coordinate: 50.0000
      South_Bounding_Coordinate: 24.0000

 Keywords:
    Theme:
      Theme_Keyword_Thesaurus: None
      Theme_Keyword: County boundaries
    Place:
      Place_Keyword_Thesaurus: Geographic Names Information System
      Place_Keyword: Conterminous United States of America (CONUS)
      Place_Keyword: Alabama AL
      Place_Keyword: Arizona AZ
      Place_Keyword: Arkansas AR
      Place_Keyword: California CA
      Place_Keyword: Colorado CO
      Place_Keyword: Connecticut CT
      Place_Keyword: Delaware DE
      Place_Keyword: District of Columbia DC
      Place_Keyword: Florida FL
      Place_Keyword: Georgia GA
      Place_Keyword: Idaho ID
      Place_Keyword: Illinois IL
      Place_Keyword: Indiana IN
      Place_Keyword: Iowa IA
      Place_Keyword: Kansas KS
      Place_Keyword: Kentucky KY
      Place_Keyword: Louisiana LA
      Place_Keyword: Maine ME
      Place_Keyword: Maryland MD
      Place_Keyword: Massachusetts MA
      Place_Keyword: Michigan MI
      Place_Keyword: Minnesota MN
      Place_Keyword: Mississippi MS
      Place_Keyword: Missouri MO
      Place_Keyword: Montana MT
      Place_Keyword: Nebraska NE
      Place_Keyword: Nevada NV
      Place_Keyword: New Hampshire NH
      Place_Keyword: New Jersey NJ
      Place_Keyword: New Mexico NM
      Place_Keyword: New York NY
      Place_Keyword: North Carolina NC
      Place_Keyword: North Dakota ND
      Place_Keyword: Ohio OH
      Place_Keyword: Oklahoma OK
      Place_Keyword: Oregon OR
      Place_Keyword: Pennsylvania PA
      Place_Keyword: Rhode Island RI
      Place_Keyword: South Carolina SC
      Place_Keyword: South Dakota SD
      Place_Keyword: Tennessee TN
      Place_Keyword: Texas TX
      Place_Keyword: Utah UT
      Place_Keyword: Vermont VT
      Place_Keyword: Virginia VA
      Place_Keyword: Washington WA
      Place_Keyword: West Virginia WV
      Place_Keyword: Wisconsin WI
      Place_Keyword: Wyoming WY


 Access_Constraints: None
 Use_Constraints: None

 Native_Data_Set_Environment:
    ArcView shapefiles for Windows 95 PC


Spatial_Reference_Information:
 Horizontal_Coordinate_System_Definition:
    Geographic:
        Latitude_Resolution: 0.0001
        Longitude_Resolution: 0.0001
        Geographic_Coordinate_Units:  Decimal Degrees
    Geodetic_Model:
        Horizontal_Datum_Name: North American Datum of 1983
        Ellipsoid_Name: Geodetic Reference System 80
        Semi-major_Axis: 6378137
        Denominator_of_Flattening_Ratio: 298.257

Entity_and_Attribute_Information:
 Detailed_Description:
  Entity_Type:
    Entity_Type_label: CNTY.SHP
    Entity_Type_Definition: County polygon attributes
    Entity_Type_Definition_Source: USGS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label:   SHAPE
    Attribute_Definition:  ArcView internal field
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  Computed
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: Polygon
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: ArcView internal field
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: Computed
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label:  AREA
    Attribute_Definition:  Area of polygon in square coverage units
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  Computed
    Attribute_Domain_Values:
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value:  -
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: Area of polygon
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: computed
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label:  PERIMETER
    Attribute_Definition:  Perimeter of polygon in coverage units
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  Computed
    Attribute_Domain_Values:
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value:  Positive real numbers
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: Perimeter of polygon
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: computed
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: CNTY_
    Attribute_Definition:  Internal feature number
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  Computed
    Attribute_Domain_Values:
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: -
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: Internal feature number
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: computed
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: CNTY_ID
    Attribute_Definition:  User-assigned feature number
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  User-defined
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: -
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: User assigned feature number
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: USEPA
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: FIPS
    Attribute_Definition: County FIPS code
    Attribute_Definition_Source: FIPS
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: 01001-56999, none=0
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: County FIPS numeric code
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: FIPS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label:  ST
    Attribute_Definition:  2 character state abbreviation
    Attribute_Definition_Source: FIPS
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: Two characters
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: State FIPS alphabetic code
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: FIPS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: CNTYNAME
    Attribute_Definition: County name
    Attribute_Definition_Source:  USGS GNIS
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: alphabetical
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: County name
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: USGS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: PLYTYPE
    Attribute_Definition: Polygon type
    Attribute_Definition_Source: See Procedures
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: 0-4 and 9
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: Polygon type
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: USGS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: WORKB
    Attribute_Definition: Basins Internal field
    Attribute_Definition_Source: USEPA
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: integer
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: Basins Internal Field
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: USEPA
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: STCOFIPS
    Attribute_Definition: State and county FIPS code
    Attribute_Definition_Source: FIPS
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: -
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: State and county FIPS code
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: FIPS
  Attribute:
    Attribute_Label: BEXT
    Attribute_Definition: Basins internal field
    Attribute_Definition_Source: USEPA
    Attribute_Domain_Values: 
       Enumerated_Domain:
         Enumerated_Domain_Value: -
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition: BASINS Internal field
         Enumerated_Domain_Value_Definition_Source: USEPA

Distribution_Information:
  Distributor:
    Contact_Information:
      Contact_Organization_Primary:
        Contact_Organization: USEPA/Office of Water/OST 
      Contact_Address:
        Address_Type: Mailing Address
        Address: 1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW (4305T)
        City: Washington
        State_or_Province: District of Columbia
        Postal_Code: 20460
        Country: USA
      Contact_Voice_Telephone: 202-566-0400
      Contact_Facsimile_Telephone: 202-566-0409
      Contact_Electronic_Mail_Address: basins@epa.gov
		Distribution_Liability:
    Although these data have been processed successfully on a computer 
    system at Tetra Tech, Inc., no warranty expressed or implied is 
    made regarding the accuracy or utility of the data on any other 
    system or for general or scientific purposes, nor shall the act of 
    distribution constitute any such warranty. This disclaimer applies 
    both to individual use of the data and aggregate use with other 
    data. It is also strongly recommended that careful attention be  
    paid to the contents of the metadata file associated with these 
    data.  The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency nor Tetra Tech, 
    Inc. shall not be held liable for improper or incorrect use of the 
    data described and/or contained herein.

  Standard_Order_Process:
    Digital_Form:
      Digital_Transfer_Information:
        Format_Name: Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) 
          ArcView Shapefile
      Digital_Transfer_Option:
        Online_Option:
          Computer_Contact_Information:
            Network_Address:
              Network_Resource_Name: http://www.epa.gov/waterscience/basins/
        Offline_Option:
          Offline_Media: CD-ROM
          Recording_Format: ISO 9660
    Fees: None
    Ordering_Instructions:
      When requesting data by phone or mail, please inquire about 
      spatial data sets that work with Better Assessment Science 
      Integrating Point and Nonpoint Sources (BASINS).  The BASINS web 
      page has instructions for downloading datasets.  It also has a 
      link to The National Center for Environmental Publications and 
      Information (NCEPI), from which BASINS CD-ROMs may be ordered.  
      Each CD-ROM contains the BASINS v2.0 Application and this data 
      set along with others covering the spatial extent of an EPA 
      Region.


Metadata_Reference_Information:
  Metadata_Date: 20070611
  Metadata_Contact:
    Contact_Information:
      Contact_Organization_Primary:
        Contact_Organization: USEPA/OW/OST
      Contact_Address:
        Address_Type: Mailing Address
        Address: 1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW (4305T)
        City: Washington
        State_or_Province: District of Columbia
        Postal_Code: 20460
        Country: USA
      Contact_Voice_Telephone: 202-566-0400
      Contact_Facsimile_Telephone: 202-566-0409
      Contact_Electronic_Mail_Address: basins@epa.gov
  Metadata_Standard_Name: FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata
  Metadata_Standard_Version: 19940608