Delaware County, Indiana
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At a time when there are substantial local government budget shortfalls, the GIS department and its many users in County and City agencies are utilizing the speed and efficiency that the GIS system provides to get information to those who need it. The ability to easily and quickly retrieve valuable information becomes increasingly important as departments are forced to reduce their staff.
Delaware County GIS Department has provided a land records website to the public for over 10 years. Unfortunately there was not an in-depth study of property-based requests prior and after the website was made available. For those of us who handle those requests in the GIS Dept, Planning Department, Auditor's and Assessors, there has been an obvious reduction of counter traffic for those typical land record requests, and the website's usage statistics show this dramatically:
Delaware County GIS Website (Beacon) Usage Statistics
July 6th 2019-July 6th 2020
| Total Requests (search, query, map identify) | 5,454,115 |
| Avg Requests / Day | 14,942.78 |
| Total Visits | 440,470 |
| Avg Visits / Day | 1,206.77 |
| Avg Requests / Visitor | 12.38 |
As the GIS department took over the maintenance of the County's land parcel boundaries from the Auditor's plat room, the days of red-lining parcel boundary changes by hand on dilapidated paper books were gone the books were scanned and archived, leaving the GIS system to bear the brunt of public land record maintenance and information requests. There has been growing pains moving from a less-than-accurate paper-based map to a much more accurate digital GIS parcel map, but the map data has improved significantly.
With a more accurate and complete parcel map, the county has been able to make sure citizens are more fairly and accurately taxed based upon the property they own. The GIS parcel data has been used by re-assessment staff to make sure areas are assessed accurately and completely. The GIS parcel data will also be used by the Assessor's office as part of a new GIS-based system that assesses farmland based upon soil types and productivity factors, which were previously done by hand using paper maps. GIS Parcel data was also used to show where tax delinquent properties were located and give potential tax sale bidders an idea of where these properties were located, helping to get those properties back on the tax roll. The Delaware-Muncie Metropolitan Plan Commission utilizes GIS on a daily basis for zoning and addressing (they maintain these GIS data sets), as well as floodplain, transportation, and other planning initiatives.
In addition to the Beacon land records viewer, the Delaware County GIS Department also provides access to other web-based maps that meet other specific needs accessible through the county website. The Historic Maps and Document Viewer provides access to aerial photos ranging from 1961 to present as well as scanned Auditor's plat books. The site also provides access to scanned subdivision plats (form the 1800s on) and surveys as they are used to update and maintain the parcel data. There are currently over 5,000 scanned documents retrievable through this application.
There are also map applications available through our ArcGIS online site that provides access to a multitude of specialized and themed interactive map applications. You can view a gallery of these maps here.
For more information, contact Kyle Johnson, GIS Coordinator, Delaware County GIS Department at 765-213-1269 or kjohnson@co.delaware.in.us, and see "GIS" under the "Your Government" heading on the Delaware County Home Page.
