Members of Mississippi’s Emergency Management Association met with members of the Forrest County Board of Supervisors Monday morning to introduce them to Crisis Track, a new damage assessment app that will help expedite assessing any property damage that might occur to residences in the county following bad weather.
MEMA partnered with the Mississippi Insurance Department for the app, with the state picking up the tab for the app.
John Buseck, chief information officer for MEMA and Thomas Brewer, GIS specialist, along with the county’s emergency management director, Glen Moore, explained the app to board members and requested that they be able to download data from the tax assessor’s office.
The app requires address point data to make the assessment process much quicker because the app already has the county’s information loaded.
Moore explained that this data is public record, and is already out on the Internet and can be pulled up by anybody. It contains no proprietary information.
Tax Collector Mary Ann Palmer, who is out of the office this week, was contacted by phone and said she had no problem sharing the information, which she said she already makes public.
Currently 20 counties in the state are have allowed MEMA to upload their information.
Buseck said in many cases there is a 30-day threshold for information to be turned in, in order for a federal declaration to be made. “This will just make that process quicker,” he said.
“Currently we use software called Collector App, which is very old, antiquated and takes a long time to get all the information gathered. It takes us somewhere in the field of months to get to our threshold values for a declaration.”
Buseck explained that once the address point date is brought into the system, they can draw a polygon around the affected area to get the threshold values.
Moore also said many times while out in the field surveying damage they have no idea the monetary value of a piece of property, but having the app will allow them to have access to that information immediately.
“In the past we’ve used out best guestimate, but being able to use the tax collector’s information will make the assessment more accurate,” he said.
Moore said from a personal standing, that the app they are currently using requires that data they go out and obtain be physically entered into the program.
“If we have the data information already preloaded into the program, it just makes our job a lot quicker and easier because we can utilize what is already there.”
The app will also allow information to automatically fill out forms, which Is now having to be done by hand.
Buseck said they want to be partners with the state’s 82 counties and will be presenting the Crisis Track app during a meeting of tax assessors from across the state during a conference Nov. 12 in Starkville.
Buseck said by trying to obtain the information as soon as possible they are trying to be both pre-emptive and proactive.
Board President David Hogan thanked the group for making the process more streamlined.
“Our employees are always trying to get those assessments done in the time frame allowed, so anything that will help to make that process go faster and more smoothly will be great.”
Buseck said MEMA was excited about this product.
“The state ate the entire cost, so there’s no cost to the county,” he said. “We really believe that at the end of this, if an event happens, that it will expedite it.
District 4’s Rod Woullard made the motion which was seconded by District 5’s Chris Bowen.
