Darien Aims To Make Payments For Town Services Easier For Residents

DARIEN, CT — The Town of Darien is embarking on a study to make payments for town services easier for residents.

First Selectman Jon Zagrodzky said during the regularly scheduled Board of Selectmen meeting Monday night that the town has been in conversations with accounting and consultancy firm CLA about conducting a study on improving payment acceptance systems.

"Whether it's some kind of town service, whether [residents] want to pay for a beach sticker or want to pay taxes, or whatever they want to do — I think the current processes we have in place are just OK right now, and you certainly can get all of those things done, but sometimes it can be difficult," Zagrodzky said. "Sometimes it's different between departments, sometimes there are certain things you might want to use to pay for something; young people use Venmo or Zelle. We're just not readily in a position to accept all that right now."

Zagrodzky said there are funds for IT consulting sitting in this year's fiscal budget that would cover the work from CLA, which is estimated to cost roughly $18,000 at the moment.

"I'm very enthusiastic about this," Zagrodzky said. "The objective would be that we can accept really any form of payment. I don't care what young people come up with, we'll be able to accept it, and it's going to integrate seamlessly with our existing general ledger and accounts payable system."

Town Administrator Jennifer Charneski said hopefully the town "will have some good outcome in a year or so."

"I think that's going to make just a big difference and make life a lot easier for anyone who is trying to pay for town services of any kind," Zagrodzky added. "Our objective is that I'd like Darien to be the most forward-thinking on that type of thing. It just makes the citizen experience a lot better."

Monday's full Board of Selectmen meeting can be viewed on-demand on DarienTV79