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Department of Taxes highlights IT modernization, low call wait times and ongoing property-tax work
Summary
The Department of Taxes told the committee its budget is driven by salaries, benefits and IT (about 90% of spending), highlighted strong phone service metrics (115,000 calls in 2025; average wait about 1:05), and described planned IT version upgrades and ongoing work on the property-tax system and vacancy challenges in compliance teams.
Andrew Stein, chief operating officer at the Department of Taxes, briefed the Ways & Means Committee on department priorities and upcoming IT work tied to the agency's budget request.
Stein said salaries, benefits and IT make up roughly 90% of the department's operating budget. "Salaries and benefits and IT account for 90% of our budget," he said, adding that the department has little discretionary room outside those categories.
On customer service measures, Stein said the department handled about 115,000 calls in calendar year 2025 with an average phone wait time of 1 minute, 5 seconds, a figure he described as unusually low compared with other states. He also pointed to a completed scanning system implementation and ongoing property-tax modernization work that still required vendor attention.
Stein described a planned version upgrade of the integrated tax system (to version 4.26) and related investments that will allow newer payment features and better automation. He said the department is using a multi-year appropriation to fund developer support for the upgrade and that the change will improve reliability and help avoid future reconciliation issues.
The department also reported a vacancy rate of about 12.3% for FY25, higher than earlier years; Stein said turnover and supervisory departures in the compliance division were a primary driver and that recruiting for audit/compliance roles is competitive nationally.
On workforce and operations, Stein described plans for an organizational development team, cross-training and a pilot phone-survey for taxpayer feedback. He said there were no requested net FTE increases for the coming year and that some positions would be reclassified when vacancies occur.
Committee members asked follow-up questions about specific line items, vacancy savings and health-care cost assumptions; the department offered to provide additional details in subsequent sessions.
