COMPLIANCE DIVISION

PROGRAM MISSION: To reduce the debt owed to the County.

The Compliance Division's responsibility is to ensure the equitable distribution of the tax burden over the County's private and business population through the prompt and efficient collection of County taxes and revenues. The Compliance Division is comprised of three functional areas: Collections Section, Lien Section and Enforcement Section.

• The Collections Section is composed of collectors who contact delinquent taxpayers by mail and telephone in an attempt to collect the overdue debt or acquire information which can be used to generate liens or other enforcement action. If a taxpayer fails to pay after issuance of a final notice, the collector assigned to the account chooses from various tools provided by Virginia law to affect payment. These tools include distress warrants for seizure of vehicles or other property; liens against wages, bank accounts or rents; seizure of state income tax refunds; warrants against funds owed to the debtor by the County; and Motions for Judgment through the appropriate court. The section also collects special assessments, returned checks, and other delinquent debts on behalf of other County departments and agencies.

• The Lien Section uses information acquired by collectors and gained through their own efforts to issue liens on wages, bank accounts, rents and commercial accounts receivable. This section effectively uses a broad range of collection powers to intercept payments which debtors would otherwise receive or secure assets of the debtors that are being held by other parties. This is complex technical work which requires interfaces with a wide variety of systems outside of the County. The Lien Section also submits delinquent accounts to the Virginia Department of Taxation's set-off debt program that enables the County to receive payment from any state income tax refund or lottery prize that is due to the debtor. The section also administers a process whereby delinquent debtors who work in Virginia are located through the Virginia Employment Commission. This enables the issuance of liens that require employers to withhold amounts due to the County from the debtor's paychecks. Another function of this section is the collection of overdue parking tickets and other department's and agencies' debts for the County and for Reagan National Airport. Included in the parking ticket collection function is a program for dealing with car rental firms and other fleet operators to affect collections of tickets issued to their vehicles.

• The Enforcement Section finalizes the efforts of the Collector and Lien Sections by performing on-site visits to enforce liens and immediately take possession or impound physical assets and currency. When required, this section will also liquidate these assets through conducting a public auction or other appropriate legal method. Additionally, the Enforcement Section renders assistance to collectors with large dollar accounts when the collection effort can be enhanced by face-to-face visits. This section is also responsible for the identification of vehicles that are not in compliance with the county vehicle licensing (decal) law. This is accomplished by on-site inspections of residential parking lots and other areas where non-compliant vehicles are likely to be found.

SIGNIFICANT BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS:

• A decrease in non-personnel expenses ($33,075) is due to the removal of $41,281 in expense for the cost of Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) withholding of automobile registrations on delinquent taxpayers, a decrease in the Department of Technology Services projected telephone costs for the department ($5,554), and an increase of $13,302 reallocated from the Administration Division.

• Revenue increased ($9,866) primarily due to the FY 2005 cost of living increase approved by the State Compensation Board and new Department of Motor Vehicle fee revenue received for the operation of the DMV Select satellite office established in November 2004.

PERFORMANCE MEASURES: