County officials on Monday approved an agreement that will provide aerial photographs that are used for the city and county’s geographic information system (GIS).
The Bartholomew County Commissioners approved a six-year agreement between Pictometry International Corp. and the Bartholomew County Assessor’s Office, where the company, which does business as EagleView, will take aerial photos of the entire county every other year.
The photos are an important input for the much-used GIS system, Beacon, but also generally help the assessors office better understand property characteristics to help inform valuation.
The agreement is for $420,000 at $70,000 a year.
The funds will be paid for out of the assessor’s reassessment fund, although the commissioners said they think that going forward the expense should be shared across different departments because of how widely the GIS system is used.
The item was on the commissioners agenda but was pushed back for that reason, the commissioners said.
