1991-02-25 Regular Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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• • Mr. Joyner has contracted with the firm of "Easy Access" to provide hardware and software systems to his clients. My staff and I have met with Mr. Joyner's computer firm and was presented with a demonstration of the proposed system he would like to install at the City of La Porte. As you know from previous discussions, I was very impressed with the system that was presented to us. I have reviewed many systems in my career and this has to be one of the best. To make it even better, the tax system runs on a Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) platform. The DEC platform was identified by Mr. Collins in the 1988 MIS Plan as being our choice for the future. I have attached a copy of the proposed system as well as a flow chart depicting the installation of the equipment. Mr. Joyner's office will be connected to the system via a modem to the base unit. He will have the capability to directly inquire into our computer database to check the status of any given account. One of the highlights of the system is that all statements are calculated on real time. The advantage of this is in the ability to reduce machine overhead and to reduce our workload. Currently, we have to calculate penalty and interest amounts each month to be added to the database. This currently involves a different processing run for each separate set of tax bills (each year plus all the supplementals), about 20 in all. With the new system, we will be able to calculate bills "on the spot" because it uses an array for the different percentages. Another great feature of the system is that the tax bills will be printed on a laser printer with Bar Code. When the statements are returned to the City with payment, we will be able to process the receipt by reading the information directly from the statement with a wand reader, thereby reducing the time required to keypunch the account and payment information into the system. We currently expend a considerable amount of effort in copying tax statements to send to the taxpayer. We currently mail them three statements, one to keep and two to return with their payment. The plan is to send back one of the two stamped paid. Most people only send back one statement to the City and request that we send them a receipt. In the past, we have had to run a whole set of tax statements to keep in our office so we can extract another copy to send the taxpayer a receipt. Occasionally, we will dust make a photo copy of the tax statement and send it back to the taxpayer. The proposed system will allow us to print receipts directly in the office that can be returned to the taxpayer. Based on the past track record of Mr. Joyner (his aggressiveness in collecting taxes) and on our needs for a better computer system, I propose that we enter into a five year contract with Mr. Joyner whereby, as part of his contract with the City to collect delinquent taxes, he provides us with a complete computer system. The contract will include a termination clause after the second year which will be correlated to a buy out option of the computer equipment.