InforME Board Meeting
October 15, 2003

Members in Attendance:

• Secretary of State Dan Gwadosky
• Dick Hinkley
• John Eldredge
• Deb Carson
• Jeff Harmon
• Marilyn Lutz
• Anne Schink
• Jaynie Higgins
• Gary Nichols
• Carrie Gott

Guests in Attendance:

• Chip Gavin, Deputy Secretary of State
• Todd Tolhurst , InforME
• Kelly Hokkanen, InforME
• Renee Loring , InforME
• Tiffany Glidden , InforME

Meeting Opens

Announcements:

• On behalf of the Board, the Chair congratulated InforME for Maine.gov's 2 nd place award in this year's Best of the Web competition.
• Carrie Gott announced that the Secretary of State's website received the third place award for constitutional officer site in Best of the Web.
• The Chair will accept the awards on behalf of the state next week at the award ceremony in New York City .

I. Cape Elizabeth Schedule B: Online Property Tax

Town Manager Michael McGovern presented the justification for this service to the Board. Usage of Rapid Renewal in Cape Elizabeth has been very high, and the town website is very advanced. Citizens are interested in having this additional online service. The service will provide the ability to pay property taxes by electronic check and will make it easy for citizens to complete payment.

Summary:

• $2 portal share from within the tax payment
• payment by e-check only
• credit cards not used because with such high amounts, the merchant fees would be very high
• average tax bill is about $4,000
• average property value is now about $270,000
• taxes are due twice per year (April & October)
• based on adoption of Rapid Renewal in Cape Elizabeth , it seems an excellent first town for the property tax payment service.

Q: Will this service allow you to integrate two systems into one, using Virtual Town Office?

A (CE): That is a hope, but unknown at this point.

Q: How many other towns use Virtual Town Hall ?

A (InforME): Four towns at this time. Others use Northern Data, but four use the Virtual Town Hall piece.

Q: Will this apply to other towns?

A (InforME): This is customized for Cape Elizabeth , and if used in other towns would need to be customized depending on their software company & backend.

Q: What is the cost of the merchant fees for credit cards?

A (InforME): Typically a little more than 2%, so it could be quite high and would have to be covered either by the town or the portal.

Q: What is the difference with an e-check?

A (InforME): It costs about 15 cents per transaction. The biggest problem with e-checks is that there can be bounced checks, just like a paper check, which result in more time and fees. The time required to move the money from one account to another is also longer with e-checks than credit cards.

Q: Will people receive an independent verification of payment?

A (InforME): There is a confirmation screen at the end of the transaction, as well as an email confirmation. An independent confirmation has not been included.

A request was made by the Board to know how much is paid for merchant fees annually.

Actions:

• Motion to approve (Jeff Harmon)
• Seconded (Gary Hinkley)
• The Board voted unanimously to approve the SLA for online property tax payment in Cape Elizabeth .

II. Dog Licensing legislation update

The Department of Agriculture has worked to get the following legislative changes:

• Participation by towns will be voluntary
• A committee is being formed to work on this project and how to handle the rabies issue for the long term in an automated way. InforME will be assisting with this.
• The Department will do random manual checks of rabies vaccination with veterinarians, until another system is established.
• An additional fee on top of the licensing fee will be allowable.
• The sticker requirement may be waived for the online service.

This is the first time that legislation has specified that an additional fee may be charged for an online service. In general, this has not been an allowable method in the past for online services. This may be a question for the Board to discuss in the future.

This service was originally approved by the Board with reservations, so the Board is pleased to see these issues addressed by the changes in legislation.

III. Service Demos

Lobster License Renewal service
Renee Loring , InforME project manager, presented a demo of the interface (prototype) for this service. This is a project with the Department of Marine Resources.

State Archives Search service
Renee Loring presented a demo of the interface for this service. This is a project with the Secretary of State's Office.

Crash Reports service
Tiffany Glidden , InforME project manager, presented a demo of the interface for this service. This is a project with the Department of Public Safety.

IV. License Plate Recap
Presentation of t.v. news coverage of the press conference with the Governor.

V. Board Photo
Rescheduled for the next (November) meeting.

Next Meetings:

• November 12
• December 17

Meeting adjourned 2:30 pm