NCACC signs contract with Wake County, IIS on property tax software

From the January 2002 issue of CountyLines

By Rebecca Troutman
Director of Research and Information Technology
and David Smith
Sales Executive, IIS

The North Carolina Association of County Commissioners, Wake County and Intelligent Information Systems (IIS) have formalized contract negotiations to enable all North Carolina counties to use Wake County’s state-of-the-art comprehensive property tax administration, collection, billing and appraisal system. Not only should our counties save millions by avoiding a software-licensing fee, but tax departments should also realize major productivity enhancements.

On Dec. 18, 2001, a contract was signed between NCACC, Wake County and Intelligent Information Systems (IIS). From left: Ron Aycock, NCACC Executive Director, Shail Jain, CEO of IIS, and Wake County manager David Cooke. (Photo by Rebecca Troutman)

Unlike many commercial tax software products available, Wake County’s software was developed specifically to comply with North Carolina property tax law, is based on streamlined tax business processes and reflects the latest Web-based technologies. Wake County estimates that it would have needed about five additional staff members to manage tax billing and listing activities alone if it had not implemented the system.

Wake County has already spent nearly $2 million developing the program and expects the final cost to be around $3.5 million. Upon completion of each of the system’s components — tax listing and billing, tax collection, and property appraisal — the County will transfer its ownership interest to the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners and IIS. All initial components of the software should be completed in late 2002 or early 2003.

In recognition of Wake County’s outstanding contribution to North Carolina county tax administration, the NCACC presented a resolution of appreciation to the Wake County Board of Commissioners at its Jan. 7, 2002 board meeting. During his presentation, NCACC Executive Director C. Ronald Aycock commended Emmett Curl, Wake County Revenue Director, Lib Wanner, Wake Chief Information Officer, and Shelley Eason, Wake County Deputy Attorney, for their foresight and diligence in making this statewide partnership a reality.

In 1999, Wake County contracted with IIS to begin developing a comprehensive tax system, with the dual purpose of making property data more accessible to those county departments and private businesses that need such information and upgrading the software to current technology standards. Wake County recognized that other counties could benefit from their development efforts and offered to make their tax system software available to all North Carolina counties through the NCACC.

In December 2000, the Association held an exploratory meeting with its members to gauge interest in an automated statewide property tax solution. Interest in the software was overwhelming, with representatives from more than 35 counties attending the initial meeting. Subsequently, eight counties — Bertie, Buncombe, Cabarrus, Catawba, Johnston, Madison, New Hanover and Wayne — agreed to serve as pilots to see how well the software would work with their existing business processes.

During these pilots, we learned that fewer systems changes would be needed to fit a broad spectrum of county tax functions than were originally anticipated. IIS is now leading a project to address the issues identified in the pilots to accommodate the additional system flexibility. Two pilot counties — Wayne and Buncombe — have contracted with IIS to begin systems implementation.

Other pilot counties are in the process of deciding whether and/or when to proceed with system implementation, while several counties not participating in the pilot have also expressed interest in the statewide system.

NCACC is offering the tax system to any North Carolina county for a $0 initial license fee. Each participating county would be responsible for the specific services needed to implement the system and for any unique customizations required by the county. Such costs could include data conversion, system interfaces, hardware and connectivity, and staff training. To minimize county conversion and interface costs, IIS is hoping to build common systems tool-set and apply these technologies in those counties with the same existing tax system.

NCACC Executive Director Ron Aycock, right, presents a resolution of appreciation to Wake County board chair Linda Coleman for the county’s efforts to make their property tax software system available to the entire state. (Photo by Todd McGee)

The ownership contract document deals with the necessary intellectual property issues and provides a framework for how the system will be offered to the counties. We also expect to use this as a model for other joint software development efforts.

To direct and control future enhancements and upgrades of Wake’s system, since no automation project should remain static, the Association is forming a tax software steering committee of user counties. The steering committee will decide what level of user fees will be assessed to bank monies for enhancements and to support maintenance, technical assistance and other “shared” services. The Association’s contracted project manager, John Ed Whitehurst, former county manager, will be staffing this committee.

One important aspect of the agreement was to formalize the relationship with IIS. IIS, assuming some ownership interest in the program, will grant NCACC perpetual free use of common code and any IIS-funded improvements. IIS has worked with Wake County for many years to develop, implement and support Wake County’s system. IIS will provide to the statewide project effort the development services necessary to complete and enhance the system, and is also available to other counties to provide implementation and customization services.

As stipulated in the contract, IIS is recommended as the preferred implementer to counties deploying the system and the exclusive developer of any enhancements to the statewide system. To maintain this designation, IIS will have to comply with performance criteria to be established by the steering committee.

NCACC and IIS will jointly own any collective development efforts as authorized by the steering committee. Individual counties may contract with IIS for specific development efforts and again, the use of these enhancements will be licensed free of charge to the statewide project users. IIS ownership in the statewide software will enable it to market the system outside of North Carolina, and any system enhancements coming through interstate development efforts will also be licensed free of charge to statewide project users.

In addition to NCACC and Wake County staff and their attorneys, Tom Thornburg with the Institute of Government and Kevin Fitzgerald, director of IOG’s Center for Public Technology, helped draft the legal and organizational documents needed to institute this program.

For more information about the automated tax system project, contact John Ed Whitehurst (919.715.4370, john.whitehurst@ncacc.org), or Rebecca Troutman (919-715-2893, rebecca.troutman@ncacc.org). In addition, the contact person at IIS is David Smith (919.572.0901 ext. 299, davids@renewal-iis.com).