SHAMOKIN - A new ordinance is proving useful toward updating Shamokin's tax rolls and ensuring residents new to the city receive a bill.
Brenda Scandle, city treasurer, added the names of 193 new residents to the city tax rolls and deleted 236 others who have since moved out of town.
There were also 158 address changes processed for city residents who moved within Shamokin but did not update their address with the tax office.
The updates are a result of the city's landlord-tenant ordinance which, among other provisions, requires landlords to register the names of all tenants of their rental properties.
"I think it's the most wonderful thing they've done since I've been in office," Scandle, who has been treasurer since 2006, said Friday of the ordinance, which was enacted midway through last year.
"We wouldn't have any idea that they were here," she said of residents identified by their landlords.
The ordinance is also generating new revenue for the city.
A landlord license under the new ordinance costs $25 and is due yearly or when new tenants move into a rental property.
As of Friday, $11,637 in license fees were collected, with code officer Rick Bozza guessing upward of 75 percent of the city's landlords having registered with City Hall.
He said he has begun seeking out landlords who failed to register with the city. A landlord convicted of violating the ordinance could be fined between $100 and $500 for each day a violation occurred.
Hundreds of municipal personal and property tax bills - estimated by Scandle at more than 600 - were returned to City Hall earlier this spring. She said it was by far the most returns received during her tenure.
Scandle uses information collected from landlords to cross-check names and addresses on the returned bills, having been able to remove up to 20 names from one address alone.
For example, she added seven residents of one North Market Street apartment building to the tax rolls and in the process, deleted the names of 15 former residents.
While the work is proving tedious - Scandle has only sorted through a fraction of the returned bills - it will go a long way to ensure people who are living in the city are receiving tax bills and cut down on time and resources spent preparing and mailing bills that are ultimately returned.
Some 300 bills were returned with forwarding address information. Those bills have been mailed again to the new addresses.
Privacy laws prevent the city from further communicating with the post office to check on who is registered at what address, Scandle said.
The pre-payment period for paying taxes ended April 30. Taxes are now due at face value. If not paid by June 30, a 10-percent penalty will be assessed. Any taxes unpaid by year's end will be turned over for collection.
School and county tax bills will be mailed later this year.