City project will photograph every property in Minneapolis

The City of Minneapolis is beginning a city-wide data collection project that includes address verification and digital photography of every property in the city. The City Assessor’s Office has hired Yotta MVS, Inc., a business that provides photographic imagery and geo-referencing data, to execute this project that will provide more detailed information about properties to the City Assessor and other departments throughout the city.

The purpose of this project is to help improve the overall quality and accuracy of property appraisals in Minneapolis and to allow the Assessor’s Office to fine tune its property data, by confirming property addresses and other information about the structure/s on a given property.

Additionally, these photographs will have a number of public safety purposes including:

Documenting graffiti on homes and businesses

Enhancing emergency preparedness operations with thorough documentation of city properties

Capturing images of buildings and businesses with "before" pictures in the event of major property damage or loss.

This comprehensive project begins Wednesday, April 21, and will take approximately six weeks to complete. Yotta staff will drive the streets of Minneapolis in clearly marked white Ford vans equipped with digital photography equipment to take photographs of the front exteriors of city properties. All photographs will be taken from city streets and under no circumstances will anyone from Yotta request to view the inside of any property.

Property taxes will not change as a result of this initiative. It is only designed for the purposes of data collection. The photos are for City of Minneapolis internal use only and will not be available in any public venue.