VALPARAISO | Porter County officials have quietly initiated the purchase of a new $355,000 software system in hope of avoiding a repeat of last year's delay in property tax bills.

The transition to L.L. Low Associates, of South Bend, is under way and if all goes well, the new software could be running in the county auditor's office by next Wednesday, said Sharon Lippens, director of the county's Information Technologies and Service Department.

Low Associates has downloaded the relevant tax information from the county's computer system and plans to return the data in the form of the new software in time for a demonstration and introductory training Thursday, she said. The results of that demonstration should be tweaked in time for the auditor to use the new software to get to work next week on this year's tax bills.

The same software will be set up for the county treasurer's office closer to billing time, Lippens said.

The purchase comes in addition to the $215,620 the county already has paid to Hamer Enterprises, of Texas, for the software that was blamed in part for last year's tax bills not being mailed out until the end of February. That software, which was backed by the Porter County Council, commissioners, auditor and treasurer, was the only one in Indiana that failed to win state certification by the Dec. 31 deadline.

County attorney Gwenn Rinkenberger, who has been working behind the scenes to help move the tax process forward, said she is recommending the county sue Hamer to recover the $92,000 licensing fee for the tax software that didn't perform as promised.

The $355,00 purchase of the new software was initiated outside of a public meeting by the county commissioners through a process Rinkenberger said is allowed in urgent circumstances. The commissioners guaranteed that Low Associates would receive $20,000 by getting the ball rolling before the entire software purchase is approved.

There was need to move quickly, Rinkenberger said, because the state is required to sign off on tax software purchases before deals are finalized by counties. The state approval is pending, and Rinkenberger said she hopes to present the purchase to commissioners during their public meeting April 7.