Norwalk tax collectors ‘make their own manual’ for new software

Biagiarelli touts $600K collected from delinquent motor vehicle bills

NORWALK, Conn. — Last July, then-Tax Assessor William Ford predicted that switching to new software would result in “a great efficiency” for his department. Now that the software transition has been made, things aren’t going well for the adjacent department, the tax collectors.

“We had a few glitches with our different software system. And we’re not getting the types of reports that we were accustomed to getting,” Norwalk Tax Collector Lisa Biagiarelli said Thursday, apologizing to Common Council members for not being able to present them with a spreadsheet for March. The new system “doesn’t operate the way we were accustomed to operating but we’re having a lot of communication with the vendor.”

Council Finance Committee Chairman Greg Burnett (D-At Large) asked her to rate her concern on a scale of one to three, with three being the worst.

She gave it a 2.5, saying she’s not able to generate reports in a timely manner but, “Chiefly concerning to me is the fact that we’re really learning as we go…. We’re kind of making our own manual.”

Ford isn’t with the City anymore. In a shakeup that surprised Deputy Assessor Paul Gorman, now interim assessor, Ford resigned his post in March just after the Council set a budget cap.

The Council on July 26 approved a $125,000 agreement with Quality Data Service (QDS) to provide tax assessment and collection software.

Ford and Chief Financial Officer Henry Dachowitz did all the talking at public meetings, pitching the idea to Council members; Biagiarelli was silent, and no one asked her opinion.

Ford’s proposal lacked details, even giving two different names for the company.

Dachowitz said Norwalk was the only municipality in Connecticut still using Munis, meaning the software was outdated and the company had little motivation to service Norwalk’s needs. Ford said this meant it lagged behind changes in State laws.

QDS is used by 90% of Connecticut municipalities and all of the larger cities, Ford said. It is the only provider handling Connecticut municipalities with 10,000 or more properties to monitor.

A NancyOnNorwalk Google search Monday turned up Gemni Software, which claims to have “been the trusted brand for Connecticut Gov’t and Municipal Software for over 30 years.”

QDS was selected through noncompetitive procurement, which requires a justification form be submitted for what is sometimes called a “no-bid contract.” Among the justifications listed by Ford were:

• Vendor must have at least 5 current Municipal clients in Connecticut AND in a city with a minimum of
  • 15,000 Real Estate Accounts
  • 50,000 Motor Vehicle Accounts
  • 2,000 Personal Property Accounts
• Vendor must have converted a minimum of one (1) municipality from Tyler Technologies/Munis

On Thursday, Biagiarelli said her department usually closes out the month and has a spreadsheet three days later. “We’re not able to do that.”

Norwalk has unique characteristics QDS isn’t built for, she said.

“Other towns don’t bill the types of revenue that we do,” Biagiarelli said. “They don’t bill sewer use the way we do. Many of them don’t have districts as we do. They don’t have multiple mill rates as we do. There’s a lot of variables with Norwalk and we’re still trying to get that new system to adapt to the way we bill. It hasn’t been easy, but we’re getting there. There’s no manual.”

Her written narrative explains, “The city’s financials, budgeting, accounting and other systems are still operating on Munis; only the assessment and tax collection modules have moved away. In the tax collector’s office, this conversion affected billing; payment entry and payment processing; reporting, including receiving and providing reports to agencies such as the town clerk’s office, the DMV, tax services and escrow agents, etc.; our IVR and online payment portals and E Tax Bill lookup; our financial reporting interface; all our recordkeeping, including fifteen years of payment and other history; and other areas as well.”

In addition, the tax collection software has operated from a “customer identification number” for decades and QDS doesn’t use that system, she said. There are other differences as well.

“We are adapting, and will continue to appreciate our taxpayers’ patience as we navigate the changes,” she wrote. “… Some of us are also still learning how to do basic functions, such as looking things up and processing payments. There is no manual; there are no written instructions to give us the kinds of reports we use; and Norwalk has variables that other municipal users of this system might not have. We are learning by doing and appreciate everyone’s patience during this process.”

Biagiarelli told Council members that Assistant Tax Collector Al Palumbo has been with the City for 30 years and she’s “worked on seven different softwares in my 39 years in tax collection.”

“We will get through it,” she said. “It is no different than any other conversion that any of us have gone through. I’m sure in the private sector, it’s exactly the same thing.”

“I’m glad you have a level of confidence that we will get through this unscathed in a very short period of time,” Burnett said.

“We have no choice,” she replied.

To NancyOnNorwalk, she said, “The bottom line is, this is our system now. We are committed to using it, we are working with the vendor to make it work for us. Ultimately some things will look a little different. There are challenges with every software conversion or upgrade but the bottom line is, the data is correct and our stakeholders can be confident of the integrity of the system and of the data. They can trust City staff to ensure they’re being properly billed and that their payments are being processed and credited properly.”

New employees, $600K in collection

In better news, Biagiarelli said the staff shortage in the eight-position department should be alleviated soon with the onboarding of two new employees who will fill vacancies left open for more than a year. The collection agency hired by the Common Council to chase delinquent motor vehicle tax bills, TaxServ Capital Services LLC, has brought in nearly $600,000 that would have disappeared into the ether, she said.

Her March 8 report explains, “In 2022, the Common Council approved the use of a third-party collection agency to bill past due motor vehicle taxes for which we had no valid address. In November 2022, this agency sent its first mailing to approximately 7,800 taxpayers on our behalf. Between December, January and now February, we have collected more than $517,000 in past due motor vehicle taxes and interest as a result of the collection agency’s billing on our behalf. Please note that these collections are made directly to the City, and payments are processed by the tax collector’s office, not the collection agency.”

TaxServ is paid via a 15% fee paid by the taxpayer, a rate set by State statute, Biagiarelli explained to NancyOnNorwalk. It’s a flat rate charged in addition to their taxes owed.

Norwalk’s previous collection agency went out of business several years ago, she said.

On Thursday, she called the past due motor vehicle taxes “funds that were not anticipated to be collected” because “the individuals had in most cases moved out of state, and were not subject to the flag at the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles.”

Council member Nora Niedzielski-Eichner (D-At Large) said that was terrific but asked if the collection could cause “really significant financial hardship” for those unable to pay.

“There’s a couple of different things at play here,” Biagiarelli replied. “In many cases, we’ve had a bill on our system for a number of years – we were not able to reach the person, the collection agency has through skip tracing found them. They’ve now been notified of this bill. And in many cases, it turns out after speaking with the people, they actually were not in Norwalk during the time period when the vehicle was taxed.”

In that case, they work with the assessor and “we have removed a lot of bills from people who should not have been taxed to begin with,” she said.

People suffering through hardships can send the City partial payments and “probably hundreds of people who are doing exactly that,” she explained. But it’s against the law for a Connecticut tax collector to negotiate.

“The debt exists because of the value of the property, with some very limited exemptions,” Biagiarelli said. “…It may be a bitter pill to swallow for individuals. But that is the system with which we are dealing.”

She added that “it hasn’t been easy to collect that amount.” She and her staff have had “literally hundreds of conversations” with unhappy people whose hardship is intensified by interest being higher than the original bill. “But the truth is we do not have the ability to negotiate. We’re precluded by state law from doing that. We’re audited, and I could lose my license over it.”