In the fourth category, nine responses emphasized the need for better knowledge of what geoscience data exist, where they exist, and how they can be accessed.

Those responses not addressing the question directly, but using it as a vehicle for commentary, included a number of responses pointing out that the length of time it took the federal government to produce geologic maps was far too excessive. Other respondents indicated they felt the federal government was not producing geologic maps in acceptable quantities. Other comments indicated that users thought that many of the more recently published, publicly available geologic maps lacked sufficient ground truth to serve the users’ purpose.