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New appraiser portal provides more information
System free to the public, but pros can get addition reports for a fee
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Shown is a screen shot of the current access site offered by the Barton County Appraiser’s Office to help the public find out property information. A new system will soon be in use.

Noting it will provide added benefits to the public, plus more detailed information for those in the real estate business, the Barton County Commission Monday morning approved contracting with Computer Information Concepts for an appraisal portal for the Appraiser’s Office. 

Through its website, Barton County provides the public with a system for viewing certain open records, County Appraiser Barb Esfeld said. It has been suggested that the current system be replaced with Computer Information Concepts’s Appraisal Portal. 

“The current system is pretty good,” Esfeld said, referring to Open Records for Kansas Appraisers (ORKA) which is offered by the State of Kansas at no charge. But, “it is very limited. And it is down quite a bit.”

Enter CIC. While the public would still have access to certain information, services would be expanded for appraisers, bankers and realtors, she said. 

Esfeld said real estate professionals have requested Barton County switch to this for some time. It is commonly used in other counties already.

Residents will still have access to the same information, as well as additional data and maps, she said. “The public will find it easier to use and better.”

While it will remain free to the public, for a subscription fee, those legally able to access the information would have the ability to view more detailed data and to run certain reports.

The initial $10,100 set-up cost will be off-set by a $500 subscription fee from each of the users. The subsequent annual $2,905 cost will be covered by fees of $200 per user.

“It will save us a lot of time,” Esfeld said of her staff that now has to run the reports. In addition, her employees can also retrieve necessary information via CIC.

“We’re not trying to make any money off of it,” she said. “We just want to pay for the system.”

This is just the latest expansion of services from CIC. In 2013, Barton County converted to CIC software to provide unified bookkeeping, off-site digital backup of county records, digital image conversion and document indexing, and employee time keeping.