Web Site Brings Together Iowa's 99 Counties

What makes the Iowa County Treasurers Association Portal stand out is not just the technology it employs, but also the collaborative effort put into pulling together 99 different counties to build a single Web site to service Iowa's 2.9 million citizens and allow them to perform myriad property tax-related activities. "Getting 99 elected officials to agree upon one process was a huge undertaking in and of itself," said Lee Duin, director of the Polk County Treasurer.

Launched in July 2002, the portal was built to offer county treasurers the means to have a Web presence through the Treasurers Office. With limited or no IT staff in some counties, this required an effective tool for adding content so treasurers could customize and maintain their own Web pages. The resulting Web site provides novices and experienced Web users an easy-to-use, browser-based content management system. This gives each county treasurer's office the ability to update its county page, FAQs and citizen information drawing upon basic word processing skills.

The Iowa State County Treasurers Association (ISCTA) spearheaded the Web site effort by organizing a Web site task force consisting of eleven county treasurers and their staff. They helped put a technology contract in place with Iowa Interactive (a subsidiary of NIC) to develop the project using a self-funded model that would not draw upon state or county government funding for project development or implementation. Instead, funding would come from user convenience fees.

The team quickly went to work on building the portal that features: over 40 forms for conducting business with the treasurers office; a Web page for each county treasurer; information on an array of services provided by county treasurers, including drivers license and motor vehicle registration; and more. A second innovation on the site allows a password-protected extranet, which is based on a browser-based content management system that allows ISCTA to provide features, such as: online training, a calendar of events, online registration for conferences, online newsletters, and a forum to share issues and ideas.

Although the system is now successfully functional, the team isn't complacent. Already they recently added a new batch processing system that allows anyone who has multiple jurisdiction taxpayers to pay online once. This new service is changing the way multi-jurisdictional taxpayers do business. Additionally in October, the system began allowing users to collect current-year property and delinquent taxes through the site as well.