ND: Business Licenses

Live in North Dakota and want to know if your local dry cleaners has a current business license? Check out today’s State Agency Database Highlight:

Business Record Search – From the website, “This database reflects current information on record with the Secretary of State. It includes database records of all corporations, limited liability companies, limited partnerships, limited liability partnerships, limited liability limited partnerships, partnership fictitious names, trade names, trademarks, and real estate investment trusts. The database includes all active records and those records inactivated within the past twelve months and may be useful to assess Name Availability for new business registrations to be filed with the Secretary of State.”

The North Dakota page of State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States is maintained by Kathryn Thomas.

NM: Film Locations

Let’s suppose you’re a filmmaker with a yen to film at a genuine New Mexico library. How would you scout out a location? Drive around the state? Call every library in New Mexican phone books? It’d probably be easier to use today’s State Agency Database Highlight:

Search Film Locations – Find filming locations in New Mexico. Database can be searched by category, sub category, location name, region, county or town. Result list shows location photos. Records have maps plus additional photos and link to request additional information about the location.

The New Mexico page of State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States is maintained by Timothy Skeers.

NJ: Projects for Pedestrians & Bicyclists

Is non-motor friendly the first phrase you think of when you think of New Jersey? How about bicycle and pedestrian projects? After you look at today’s State Agency Database Highlight, you may think again:

• New Jersey Bicycle/Pedestrian Project Database – Activated in 2005 to provide information to assist in planning, designing, building and maintaining facilities for bicyclists and pedestrians, the database contains information submitted by individuals and agencies on project type, location, cost and funding. The database is not all-inclusive.

The NJ Bicycle/Pedestrian Project Database was added to the New Jersey page of State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States by Stephanie Bartz. The page as a whole does not yet have a volunteer to keep it up to date. Will you take up the challenge? If so, please e-mail Daniel Cornwall at dnlcornwall *AT* alaska *Dot* net.

AK: Plans Library

Government at all levels involves a lot of planning. In the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, unadvertised municipal plans were kept in locked basements that were only open to the public a few hours a month. Fortunately in the age of the internet, plans are easier to find. Just look at Today’s State Agency Database Highlight:

• Plans Library– From the website, “The Library contains a wide assortment of plans submitted to the Division of Community & Regional Affairs (DCRA) by communities, agencies and contractors. The database contains Community Plans, Comprehensive Plans, Economic Development Plans, and Strategic Plans among many more general and project related plans (such as Water Waste Plans, Relocation Plans etc).”

Aside from being worthwhile documents in themselves (check out a few if you don’t believe me), plans are a valuable source of local history. Communities that have never had their local history set down in book form often have several pages worth of local history in plans. There are also often descriptions of current local conditions and lists of leading people and organizations in the community. Plans are useful to the historian and sociologist as well as to the community planner. Go check them out.

The Alaska page of State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States is maintained by Sheri Somerville.