Berrien County, Mich., Selects Public Records Management System

In July, Berrien County commissioners approved the $185,000 purchase of a public records management system from HartInterCivic. The county will pay for the system with funds raised through the Michigan Register of Deeds Technology Fund. Implementation of the system is currently underway and scheduled for completion by the end of 2004.

The Anthem System is replacing an internally built land records application that the Berrien County Register of Deeds office has been using for over 20 years. The new system will be able to integrate with Berrien's countywide imaging system to provide maximum access to imaged documents. In addition, Anthem will significantly reduce many of the time consuming manual processes that must be completed for the recordation of a document as well as allow for flexibility in the office procedures.

In the future, Berrien County's plans call for Anthem to enable convenient public access to documents, which will enhance productivity and accuracy while protecting data integrity and accessibility to the information.

"Anthem is a very technologically advanced system that will integrate with our countywide imaging system. One of the most beneficial features of Anthem to Berrien County is its ability to enable electronically 'linked' documents so that we can cut down on some of our time-consuming manual processes associated with hand searching to see if a mortgage, lien or other document has been discharged, assigned, etc.," Lori Jarvis, Berrien County Register of Deeds, said.

Anthem will also provide for electronic recording (eRecording) of documents. Initially this will be an intra-county process within Berrien County offices with planned rollout to the community in 2005-2006. ERecording allows title companies and others to electronically submit for recording real estate documents from any location, at any time of the day or night. Universal eRecording Counter(TM), a feature of Anthem, can accept all electronic documents that meet standards established by the Property Records Industry Association (PRIA), regardless of the format used to create them.