How DEVNET and Sarpy County, NE are working together to make property valuation and taxation easier by fully integrating property tax, mass appraisal (CAMA), and geographic information systems (GIS). Presented at the biannual meeting of the Nebraska GIS/LIS Association in Kearney, NE, April 2013.

1. Integration Points for Property
Tax, CAMA, & GIS
Jason A. Crome
Vice President of Software Development, DEVNET, Inc.
2013 Nebraska GIS/LIS Biennial Symposium
April 16, 2013

2. Project Overview
• Sarpy County enters contract with
DEVNET to modernize Property Tax and
CAMA software in Fall 2012
• Project aims to improve tax cycle efficiency
through automation, integration, and
improved workflow

3. Integration Goals
• Make property tax data, CAMA data, and GIS
available to the user through a single application
• Reduce duplicate work where possible
• Visualize property tax and CAMA data in
meaningful ways.
• Make it easy for non-technical users to produce
complex maps in GIS

4. Areas of Integration
• Property Tax
• CAMA
• Sketching
• GIS
• Imaging
• Pictometry
• E911

5. Integration Overview

6. Building the Interface

7. Options
• Use Esri APIs
• Use existing county GIS applications
• Do something else (!!!)

8. Use County Apps
• Faster time to production
• Browser-based; easy to embed
• County users already familiar with them
• Cooperative county GIS department makes
this easy and attractive

9. Interface Options
• Pass parcels through URL
• Exchange parcel data through shared
database table(s)
• Web Services

10. Pass Parcels through URL
• Advantages: Easy to implement
• Disadvantages: slow, breaks down for large
result sets (unexpected truncation of
URLs)

11. Web Services
• Advantages: well-accepted, well-
documented, lots of good tools for
creating/consuming
• Disadvantages: lots of crappy tools for
creating/consuming, sometimes slow,
sometimes quirky, often verbose (XML,
anyone?)

12. XML Web Services

13. Shared Database Table
• Advantages: easy to implement, fast set-
based operations, builds cooperation and
trust between IT staff and vendor(s)
• Disadvantages: need cooperation and trust
between IT staff and vendor(s)

14. Implementation
• Simple table containing a unique ID, session
ID, and parcel number
• Tax/CAMA apps always fill table with
session ID and parcel(s) we want to map
• Action-specific URL called with session ID
• GIS looks into table with session ID and
generates desired map

15. Implementation (cont.)
• When we want map to drive tax/CAMA,
call GIS with session ID and blank table
• After action performed in GIS, table filled
with parcels and session ID
• Event triggered in tax/CAMA, reads table
contents, responds appropriately

16. Workflow

17. Splits, Combines, etc.
• Parcels split/combined in GIS first
• Addressed in E911
• By the time it gets to us, can import site
address, legal description, acreage, soil data

18. How?
• Have direct read access into county
geodatabase
• County tells us where to find the data we
care about

19. Desktop Integration
Points

20. Viewing a Parcel

21. Viewing Ag Land

22. Viewing Pictometry

23. Sketching

24. Imaging

25. Search Results

26. Putting It All Together...

27. ...on Multiple Monitors!

28. Other Desktop Integration Points
• Comparable Properties
• Ratio Studies
• Neighborhoods
• ....Anywhere we have a list of parcels

29. Other Desktop Integration Points (cont.)

30. Web Integration Points

31. Viewing a Parcel

32. Viewing Ag Land

33. Images

34. Appraisal/Sketches

35. Search Results

36. Demo!!!

37. Questions?

38. Thanks!
For more information:
http://www.devnetinc.com
info@devnetinc.com
Contact Jason at:
crome@devnetinc.com