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Under the new Indiana Uniform Property Tax Management System administrative rule (50 IAC 23), set by the Indiana Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF), all Indiana counties were required, by the end of June, 2010, to have uniform, common and integrated property tax management systems certified by the state. Specifically the law stipulates that “The complete software system currently in use by county officials—assessor, auditor and treasurer—must meet certain performance benchmarks related to the administration of the property tax assessment and billing process.” After its passing in July of 2006, the law called for a two-phase approach. During Phase I, all Computer Aided Mass Appraisal (CAMA) and Tax software vendors in the State of Indiana were to make the necessary changes to their software in order to comply with the DLGF law. Manatron, the largest provider of integrated CAMA and tax software and services in Indiana, serving 74 out of the state’s 92 counties, was certified by the State in the fall 2008. Phase II of the mandate required each individual county to have their software system tested and certified for functionality and compatibility by an independent, third-party testing authority by June 30, 2010*.
By the June due date many counties that use Manatron’s integrated CAMA and tax software received written DLGF certification or verbal confirmation of the State’s intention to issue certification. Some of these counties included: Adams, Warren Vanderburgh, Benton, Gibson, Jefferson, Lawrence, Pike and Posey Counties. In order to ensure that its software was compliant and that all its Indiana customers would receive certification under the DLGF mandates, Manatron invested a great amount of both capital and human resources to achieve Phase I certification. “We put in over 10,000 hours during a two-year period to assist our county customers in making the necessary changes,” said Scott Stephens, Vice President of Indiana Operations for Manatron. “All of that hard work paid off and we are very pleased to see that our customers are achieving certification, some ahead of schedule.” However, achieving individual county DLGF certification was not solely dependent on Manatron’s efforts. Under Phase II, individual counties had additional work to complete before receiving certification. Patrick Norton, Director of Information Systems for Adams County addressed some of those challenges. “We spent about 200 man-hours getting the county’s systems up to speed. A lot of time configuring the workflow between the Auditor’s, Assessor’s and Treasurer’s office to make sure all of our data-sets matched.”
Norton credits Manatron for making it easier for the County to comply with the new law. “It was a big challenge to comply with all the legislative changes, but in the end, Manatron’s work was very helpful to us. In addition, because all three—Assessor’s, Treasurer’s and Auditor’s offices use Manatron systems, it was a lot easier to get it all integrated than other counties that must deal with different vendors each with different software.” Another county that relied on Manatron to achieve certification was Vanderburgh, one of the largest counties in the state. However, before moving ahead with the process, Vanderburgh County officials had to evaluate the current state of their existing tax software, which had been developed many years ago. "The cost and effort to certify that software would have been cost prohibitive," said Bill Fluty, Vanderburgh County Auditor. "We also knew the functionality of the software had fallen behind, so we wanted to turn to a new solution that would also improve our process efficiencies." Vanderburgh County selected Manatron to address the tax billing and collection challenge the county faced. “Manatron is the largest provider of tax software systems in the state and in addition they are a very stable company,” said Fluty. Another key reason for the selection of Manatron, according to Fluty, was that they were one of the first solution providers to be certified by the State of Indiana’s DLGF. "They never flinched when considering our requirements. Their people were great, working very hard to deploy the new tax solution within the time frame we required.”
Rick Davis, Vanderburgh County Treasurer, agreed with Fluty’s assessment. “Manatron and their staff did the heavy lifting for us. We could not have done it without them,” he said. “So from my point of view the partnership has turned out very well,” concluded Fluty. “Manatron delivered exactly what they said they would, and in the future, because of their work, it will be easier to comply with legislative requirements and upgrades. We hope to work together for many years to come.”
*Deadline extended on July 28 to September 1 by the State of Indiana.