Murrysville upgrades its information system for code enforcement

Murrysville’s new code enforcement officer is taking the lead in helping the municipality upgrade the system it uses to track information about properties.

Code enforcement officer Josh Steele said the system, bought in the 1990s, has reached the end of its usefulness.

“It works really well for what it does, but the last time it was updated was 2002, and the company no longer makes updates,” Steele said.

Council members approved about $18,000 to upgrade the system through Harrisburg-based GeoDecisions. The initial cost includes training and migrating data from the existing system, with an annual cost of $2,000.

A geographic information system, or GIS, allows users to interact with maps displaying things like property lines, deed cards and other public property-related data. Westmoreland County has a public-facing GIS system called ARC-GIS.

“We call things up by address or lot number,” Chief Administrator Jim Morrison said. All the records of that particular property are stored in the management system. “It can produce queries like how many permits were issued for porch additions in the past six months, and it helps keep code enforcement on the road, because they have tablets that connect to the system.”

Steele said GeoDecisions also backs up the municipality’s data off-site, “and it would allow us to grant the public access to parts of it through a public portal.”

In 2016, GeoDecisions worked with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation to redesign and re-platform PennDOT online methods to capture and process forms, data, and environmental assessments

Steele estimated that the $2,000 annual payments would be a slight savings over the municipality’s current GIS costs.

Council voted 6-0 to approve the upgrade at its Jan. 20 meeting; council President Dayne Dice was not present.