Atlantic County clerk sharing real-estate records with municipalities

All public records available on-line from the Atlantic County Clerk's Office are now being provided free to the county's municipalities.

Those records include all real estate transaction documents such as deeds and mortgages recorded at the Clerk's Office, along with major and minor subdivision maps.

Property transaction records are useful to many municipal departments such as tax assessors and tax collectors. The records are also available to local public safety departments and law enforcement.

Other county offices - such as the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office and the county Department of Regional Planning and Economic Devel opment - already share the clerk's database.

"The Clerk's Office is pro-active in researching and developing technology that will benefit all governments in Atlantic County," County Clerk Ed McGettigan said.

McGettigan said the the Clerk's Office database with document images has already reduced the need for paper storage within the office and should have a similar effect on the municipal offices that store copies of these documents.

McGettigan said that sharing government services has become an important objective in New Jersey to offset rising property taxes on all levels. The Clerk's Office will continue to increase its ability to share services with local governments as new applications are found, he said.

"The free flow of information between departments and all levels of government is vital, especially in a time when both increased speed and lowering costs are so critical to the safety and well being of our citizens," he said.

Internet access to property records was recently offered commercially to title companies and financial institutions by the Clerk's Office.

The Clerk's Office has been aggressively pursuing technology to reduce the need for paper copies and to improve access to the public. Those initiatives have included the implementation of computer systems to accommodate scanning documents, off-site electronic storage and Internet access as well as "electronic recording," a process for recording deeds and mortgages with the Clerk's Office via the Internet.

Limited access to land documents is currently available to the general public at the Clerk's Office Web site:

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The public can view the index and first pages of selected deeds or mortgages, but cannot access entire documents without first opening an account with the Clerk's Office.

To e-mail Thomas Barlas:

TBarlas@pressofac.com