State planners brief Sussex County on 2025 'Strategies for State Policies and Spending'; council presses for updated sewer, road and data alignment

David Eshel, director of the Office of State Planning Coordination, told the Sussex County Council on Feb. 25 that the state is in the middle of the sixth five‑year update to the Strategies for State Policies and Spending and expects to deliver the 2025 update in July 2025.

The presentation focused on how the Office of State Planning Coordination (OSPC) and agency partners run a GIS‑based methodology to score and map areas that “favor development” (levels 1–3), discourage development (level 4) or are legally protected (out of play). Josh Thomas, principal planner and policy lead for the update, said the office reruns a full data analysis each cycle and “incorporates new data” including county comprehensive plans, agency data layers and program areas such as Transportation Improvement Districts (TIDs).

Why it matters: county officials said the maps and data drive decisions about where state and local infrastructure money should go. Several council members urged quicker, clearer incorporation of county sewer plans and recent construction activity into the state mapping and asked how the maps relate to DelDOT project priorities, especially for Route 1 and other congested corridors.

State presenters summarized the update process and the data inputs. Jason Vogel, statewide geospatial data coordinator, described the GIS workflow and the principal datasets that feed the map (municipal and…