GIS enhances Alabama’s tax assessors’ office

It is the place where scientists worked to put a man on the moon and where rocket and missile technology was developed.

Its population has grown from a few thousand in the early 1950s to over 255,000 in the 1990s.

With such a rich technological history and a booming population, it makes sense that Huntsville, Ala., is using GIS technology to enhance parcel surveying and mapping. Located in Madison County, Huntsville serves as the hub for a steadily growing mix of commercial, industrial and residential property development covering approximately 806 square miles and over 122,000 parcels of land. The continued growth of the county presents a big challenge for Tax Assessor Wayland Cooley and the Alabama Tax Assessors’ Office. The county first investigated computer mapping technology in the late 1980s and implemented its first base mapping for tax assessing purposes in the early 1990s.

“We’re known as a high-tech area. Aerospace, electronics, computers and manufacturing have all contributed to this reputation,” Cooley says. “We’re always looking for ways to use technology to improve our operations.” The tax assessor’s GIS group uses tax office software from locally based Intergraph Software Solutions and system implementation from Southern Digital Services, Franklin, Tenn.

The office uses 14 workstations that run on the Microsoft Windows NT operating system with Microstation and MGE software. “Even though our maps had been digitized using land ground detail, our parcels didn’t really have that much information,” says Dee Phillips, GIS project supervisor and an Alabama Certified Mapper. “Now, we’re considered top-of-the-line with our maps. With this technology we are linking our Computer Aided Mass Appraisal (CAMA) information from an IBM database to a graphical representation of the parcel. We’ve completed more than 50 percent of the linking, but we’ve seen results right from the start.”

The county found several parcels of land that had never been assessed and some duplicate assessments as well in the first months of operation with the GIS software. Since then, the search time for parcels has been reduced considerably, improving customer satisfaction.

“Using geo numbers, we can search for parcel information and then display it graphically on the screen in just seconds, where a physical search using plat and deed books takes several minutes,” Phillips says. “Right now, we can show the parcel and any structure on it.” The system can be used to quickly obtain variance information by clicking on a parcel and requesting the names of all property owners within 500 feet, information that is displayed within seconds. In the future, the county will locate information in a number of ways, including by property owner names, by parcel numbers, by account numbers, by street address and by subdivision legal description.

“The state of Alabama is moving toward graphic representation of parcels, and this system fits into that plan extremely well,” Phillips says. “We are better able to keep up with everything and totally automate our process.” In addition, the county has developed new methods of providing services to bring in revenue. For example, when staff members conduct a search for a parcel on the computer system, and the customer wants a copy, it is printed out on the spot for a fee.

The Internet is also being investigated as an avenue for providing specialized fee-paid services for the real estate and building industries as well as for attorneys, property appraisers and title companies, allowing customers to access certain information while still protecting sensitive information with computer firewalls. The county is also exploring transferring data to a read-only compact disk for sale to the public. “Our focus is on serving our customers–the public–in the most professional, economical way we can,” Phillips says.

“This system and its cutting-edge technology helps us meet our goals while providing new opportunities for improved service and increased revenue.