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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us November 3, 2005 Talent to take credit, debit cards for traffic tickets, utility bills By Jennifer Squires Ashland Daily Tidings TALENT — Come December, paying traffic tickets and utility bills in the city of Talent will be as easy as swiping a card. The Talent City Council unanimously approved the use of debit and credit cards to pay some city bills at its Wednesday evening meeting. The program will start in December and will only be available to walk-in customers at City Hall. Eventually, the city would like to extend the program to include online and over-the-phone payments. Although the city will be charged a service fee for each transaction and had to purchase equipment for the program, city staff believe the program will bring in enough revenue to compensate for those charges. Staff expect the percentage of traffic fines collected to rise. “Court charges are, a lot of times, they’re not even people living in Talent,” City Manager Betty Wheeler said, explaining once those people leave town, it’s difficult to obtain their payments. “I would like to eliminate using a collection agency because they take half of it.” Adding credit and debit card transactions is the third step in upgrading the utility billing system in Talent. The city organized the way shutoffs — reminders, final notices and services ended — are done and, in July, the city started using a new software program to manage utility bills. “Getting our collections in a more manageable format has a lot of pieces to it,” Wheeler said. The council also OK’d changes to the minimum lot size required in one residential zone. The alterations, suggested by the Talent Planning Commission, reduced the lot size for single-family homes built on parcels smaller than two acres and set a maximum number of dwellings per acre for single-family homes, duplexes, townhouses and apartments. “This has been my personal goal,” planning commissioner Teresa Cooke said. “I realized there was a glitch in how we were doing it.” The change will aid infill, the city planning staff believes, and could reduce the number of planned unit developments — those that need exemptions from some city ordinances to be built — because constructing enough housing units to meet the city’s density requirements will be easier. In other business: • Talent Police Chief Bob Rector introduced Red Smith, a retired Jackson County Sheriff’s deputy who has been hired as the city’s code enforcement officer; • the council passed a resolution authorizing the Talent Urban Renewal Agency to maintain urban renewal projects within the city for two years. Previously, the agency cared for the improvements for one year. Staff writer Jennifer Squires can be reached at 482-3456 x 3019 or [email protected]. DailyTidings.com Home Page Archives | Revels | Classifieds | Real Estate Guide | Weather | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2005 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Deep Muscle Stimulator Ceramic Piggy Banks FREE Entertainment Guide Women's & Men's Slippers Accelerate Weightloss Products Backpacks Generic Viagra Vegas Travel Guide Search Engine Optimization Sportsbook Absinthe Supply Student Loans Hotel & Airline Reservations African Safari Hammocks Helzberg Diamonds Online Casinos Community Bonus Casino King of Spirits ink cartridges Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Mailing Lists Click Here Advertisement .:Advertisements:. Site Search: RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams