This episode of the Tyler Tech Podcast features a conversation with Chris Merdon, president of Tyler’s Appraisal & Tax Division, and Tyler appraisal experts Mike McFarlane and John Valente on leadership, innovation, and the future of property appraisal. Drawing on more than 30 years of public sector experience, Chris shares insights on client-focused leadership and the evolving role of technology in appraisal and tax administration. The discussion explores how artificial intelligence, cloud technology, and data-driven processes are reshaping agency operations, along with the opportunities and challenges associated with modernization, workforce transitions, and technology adoption. The group also examines emerging trends such as automation, advanced analytics, and integrated platforms, emphasizing the importance of collaboration, education, and long-term planning as governments modernize services while continuing to meet the needs of the residents they serve.
In this episode of the Tyler Tech Podcast, Chris Merdon, president of Tyler’s Appraisal & Tax Division, joins Tyler appraisal experts Mike McFarlane and John Valente for a conversation about leadership, innovation, and the future of property appraisal. Drawing on more than 30 years of public sector experience, Chris shares his perspective on client-focused leadership, emerging technologies, and the evolving needs of government agencies.
The discussion explores how artificial intelligence, cloud technology, and data-driven processes are reshaping appraisal and tax administration. Chris, Mike, and John examine the opportunities and challenges that come with modernization, including workforce transitions, technology adoption, and the importance of helping agencies navigate change at a pace that aligns with their goals and priorities.
The episode also looks ahead to the future of the appraisal industry, from automation and advanced analytics to more integrated platforms and service delivery models. Throughout the conversation, Chris emphasizes the importance of collaboration, education, and long-term planning as governments work to modernize operations while continuing to deliver trusted services to the residents they serve.
This episode also highlights emerging strategies for building efficiency in the public sector, with insights into how agencies are using technology and process improvements to do more with existing resources.
· Download: How Governments Build Efficiency at Scale
And learn more about the topics discussed in this episode with these resources:
· Download: AI for Impact: Proven Results for Government
· Download: AI Modeling & Statistics Overview
· Download: State CIO 2026 Priorities Playbook
· Download: Modern Governments Live in the Cloud
· Read: Thriving Amid Constraints: Strategies for Assessment Offices
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Chris Merdon: Our clients don’t necessarily have the time to think about sort of what’s the next generation of where we’re going. So that’s our job. We have to have that foresight and then bring that foresight to our clients and lead them down the path.
Josh Henderson: From Tyler Technologies, this is the Tyler Tech Podcast. I’m your host, Josh Henderson. Today, we’re sharing a conversation with Chris Merdon, president of Tyler’s appraisal and tax division. Taking on hosting duties for this episode are Mike McFarlane and John Valente, two Tyler appraisal experts who work closely with assessing agencies across the country. Together, they explore Chris’ vision for the future of appraisal and tax administration, including the role of AI, cloud technology, and client focused innovation in helping government agencies modernize while continuing to serve residents effectively.
So, without further ado, here’s Chris, Mike, and John.
John Valente: So, Chris, we’re going to kick it off and just go through a series of questions that we worked up. Michael and I have been chatting for a while about this. So, tell us a little bit about your background and how you found your way to Tyler. What compelled you to join Tyler as a company?
Chris Merdon: Yeah. Well, I’ve always admired Tyler from a little bit afar. I’ve been in the public sector my entire career. So, I’ve been in public sector for 30+ years.
I’ve been kind of all over public sector as an elected official in Howard County, Maryland, later became a government CIO, but I’ve also always been in the vendor space, mostly in systems integration. So, for the last ten years, I’ve been with NTT Data, where as their group president overseeing all their federal, state, and local government business, as well as some international business. And frankly, you can’t sort of avoid seeing and hearing the Tyler name anytime you talk about public sector. So, you know, it’s really an interesting company to watch over the years, the amount of acquisitions that Tyler was doing and sort of the integration into every part of government and public sectors is really exciting.
And I think I really sort of got the attention from Tyler when they did the NIC acquisition. I mostly played in the state space, and that was you know, NIC obviously was a big player in that space. So, I always had a lot of admiration for Tyler as a company. I came to Tyler through the recruitment process.
So, a recruiter reached out, and while I was not sure that I wanted to continue working, I had retired for a year and was really enjoying that, the opportunity to work with the Tyler team seemed interesting. And then when I started talking to everybody at Tyler, it really became very intriguing. I really love the culture here. I love the people.
I love the philosophy of the company.
And I also like the fact that Tyler’s 100% dedicated to the public sector. Other companies I worked with in the past, you know, NTT Data, JPMorgan, and others, they do public sector, but it’s not core to who they are. And Tyler, it’s obviously the only thing that we do, and that was really attractive.
Mike McFarlane: Awesome. It sounds like a great fit, Chris. And, again, welcome to Tyler.
How would you describe your leadership style? Is there anything specific you think will impact the division or the products moving forward?
Chris Merdon: Yeah. I think when you think about leadership style, you have to kind of go to what your core values are. My core values really center around client-first, teamwork, and foresight. Client-first, everything that I do as a leader really is focused on what’s going to help our clients advance their mission.
So, when we think about building our own leadership team, making sure that we have people on our team that are very client focused, that everything that they do, every time they wake up every morning thinking about their work, it is how are we going to improve the experience for our client, making sure that our products are very client centric. Would seem to be pretty obvious, but sometimes companies can kind of get wrapped up in their own vision of the world, and we have to constantly bring ourselves back to what is best for the clients. So, ensuring that the product works the way that our clients work and meets their needs.
From a teamwork perspective, it all has to happen with the team. It’s going to take everybody on our team to make sure they’re meeting the client’s mission, whether it’s somebody who’s taking a support phone call, or somebody who’s thinking about where the product is or product’s road map is going for our clients. It really requires that entire team to meet the client mission.
And then finally, foresight. We’ve got to always be thinking cutting edge. Where are we going with our client?
Where are our clients going? I want to make sure that, you know, we’re skating sort of to the puck and meeting them where they need to be. Our clients don’t necessarily have the time to think about sort of what’s the next generation of where we’re going. So that’s our job.
We have to have that foresight and then bring that foresight to our clients and lead them down the path.
John Valente: I think teamwork is really important. I’m glad you brought that up. And so, Tyler employees, what sort of focus, I know you said we have to have client focus, but what do you mean by that for a Tyler employee? What should they be doing to maintain Tyler focus and clients?
Chris Merdon: Well, I think every action that they take, they have to view it as how is that impacting the client. Sometimes we want to be extremely forward-thinking, particularly when it comes to technology.
But we also we have to realize that not all of our clients want to be on that forefront. Governments tend to be a little bit more reserved in their approach. So, we have to think about, while we’re advancing technology, we want to make sure that we’re bringing our clients along.
So, every time we’re trying to improve things, we want to make sure we understand what the impact is on our client. You know, you have to think about sort of the sensitivity of our actions on the client. So, when a client calls with a support ticket, we want to make sure that we get back to them as quick as possible with the correct answer. Seems very basic.
But you can after receiving potentially hundreds and thousands of calls over the course of a year, it could be sometimes you become a little mundane, and we can’t let that happen.
We always have to be thinking, how is this going to impact my client? How can I improve that experience for the client?
The impact of AI, while I think we have a great vision, I think it’s going to come in sort of two different flavors.
So, there’s the impact that AI will have on us internally, on how we develop products, how we think about data conversion, how we think about all the tools that we need to do to help our clients out. And then we have to think about sort of, the second set is, how does AI impact our clients, you know? Or is it more agentic AI where we want to help our clients with sort of the more routine tasks, and helping them achieve those?
So, you know, I think about it in those two different buckets.
John Valente: I often talk about fear with AI. Clients are so afraid of it. Some of them are interested in doing it, but they’re afraid. And I think that goes back to the education. If we could educate them about what AI does and have some guardrails around it so they can feel comfortable and safe with what we’re trying to do. And I think that’s what Tyler’s doing. They’re taking a more systemic, slow growth pattern to enable people to embrace AI over time.
So, thank you for that answer.
Mike McFarlane: Chris, thanks for the perspective. All things considered, what impact do you think these rapidly advancing technologies and implementation thereof will have on our clients?
Chris Merdon: So, I think we have to always keep in mind, we have to meet our clients where they are. So, I think I can safely say that Tyler is going to be in the forefront. We are thinking about these technology changes on a day-to-day basis.
We’re gaining input from our clients, but we really have to meet our clients where they are, and that’s going to vary greatly by client. We have some clients that are a little bit more cutting edge. I think Leon County is a great example of that. They really want to sort of take advantage and step up to the plate and implement the latest and greatest technology.
Other clients are really going to wait, take a sort of wait and see approach. I think the best thing that we can do in preparing our clients is just constant communication.
It’s not only us telling our clients what they can expect and how we can help them on this technology journey, but they’re going to be looking to their peers. They’re going to be looking to their peers and say, who’s done this before?
What was their experience like? What should I be prepared for before they take that next step? I think if we can educate in that way, make our clients comfortable on the journey, I think your adoption rate is going to be much higher.
John Valente: And I think that acceptance really is going to be drawn out in terms of our involvement with clients, asking them their input as to what we’re doing as opposed to just feeding them and saying, this is the answer that we have. Please just adopt it. So, if we ask them along the way, what do you like about this? What do you like about the cloud?
How can we make changes for you that are efficient, that don’t disrupt your day-to-day business? So, let’s go on to the cloud and talk about that. So, what are the benefits to go into the cloud, Chris? Because this is a new endeavor by Tyler.
They’ve been on-prem for years, and clients have gotten used to that. Now we’re talking about going to the cloud. So, what are the benefits, Chris?
Chris Merdon: And so, to answer that question, I think you have to split apart or bifurcate sort of who the client is. Because we have multiple clients within a particular county.
So, I think about clients from an IT perspective. Think about the county CIO, one of which I used to be. So, that county CIO is thinking about the infrastructure, the data center, the hosting environment, those types of things.
And then you have the client who’s actually user of the system, either the appraiser or the treasurer or something along that line that’s actually using the system for their business need. They think about the cloud probably two very different ways. The CIO, by us helping our clients move to the cloud, the CIO lightens their load a lot.
They don’t have to worry about the hosting environment. They can almost sort of take a step back and be more the orchestrator with multiple vendors, orchestrating the county’s presence in the cloud.
So, I would think it probably has a bigger impact on the county CIO than it maybe does on the end user or the business user. From the business user’s perspective, if we do our job right, they shouldn’t notice a whole lot of difference.
Like, where their data lives, where their infrastructure is, really shouldn’t matter to them. Does the system work today the way that it did yesterday before we went to the cloud? If we can achieve that, then I think we’ve been successful.
I do think from an ease of use, from a maintenance perspective, right now, we have so many clients on-prem with potentially different releases of the product. Not everybody takes that sort of step and goes to the next release. It becomes a little bit harder to manage for us and potentially for our clients. Getting everybody into the cloud on the same release, having the same features, same modules, same functions, is much easier from a client support perspective.
We’re not trying to figure out where the variation is when we’re answering a support ticket. So therefore, I think we can be a lot more efficient in responding to our clients’ needs.
John Valente: So, the versions are going to be somewhat standardized, but some of the custom work that’s been done for years with clients, like state regulations, they’re still going to be maintained. We’re not going to lose that. I think some folks are concerned that once we go to the standardized version, we’re going to lose all of that uniqueness that we’ve really liked that Tyler’s given us.
Chris Merdon: That is obviously a primary goal. We have to do it that way. We are in so many states with very different legislative requirements. We’re going to need to ensure that the same functionality exists. Just as I said before, it should work tomorrow the same way that it works today, just a different environment.
Josh Henderson: Stay tuned. We’ll be right back with more of the Tyler Tech Podcast.
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Jade Champion: Now let’s get back to the Tyler Tech Podcast.
Mike McFarlane: John, you’re well aware of this, but the appraisal industry itself is rapidly changing both in terms of technology and meeting the needs of the clients as well as the public perception, the heightened awareness, particularly for ad valorem assessments. Chris, how do you see Tyler’s Appraisal & Tax Division able to adequately respond to the changing needs of the appraisal industry?
Chris Merdon: So, I think we’re going to change pretty significantly over a period of time. Right now, we are in a very labor intense data gathering type of solution.
Feet on the street, people out doing house by house appraisals. I do think that changes pretty significantly with AI, and we move to more of an automated way of data gathering, and that’ll be the sort of the easier part, and we try and move into sort of a more analytical solution versus more of a labor solution. John, you’re working on some AI stuff in Leon County and with some other clients. What are you seeing as that change?
John Valente: It’s really exciting. People are opening up to change and getting away from boots on the ground or data collection. They see the capacity and ability, but there’s still that fear that’s going on among clients. I’m seeing this interaction. I’m working in Leon County now, which has been a great hope. We’ve got this interaction with clients who are interested.
They want to give us input. They want to incorporate the way AI can work best for them, which is very exciting. So, I think that is the future for the industry and integration so that we take our offerings and really integrate it. A lot of companies are just coming in from the outside and saying, here we have AI for you.
Here are all the answers. Just take it. Whereas Tyler’s approach is more measured, and it’s taking this input of the assessors, which I think is the best way. And it goes back to your point earlier, Chris, about being client-focused, and that’s where we need to go ahead.
And it’s beneficial not just to the client. It’s beneficial to us. We get up in the morning, and we can say we’re engaging with our clients. I don’t have to say I’ve got all of the answers.
I’m working collaboratively with clients, and AI is a new frontier for us to do that. And so, I’m really excited about it after being in the profession for so many years. It’s really probably the most excitement I’ve had in a long time.
Chris Merdon: Do boots on the ground go away completely?
John Valente: To some extent, they can go away. Yeah. I think there’ll always be a need for going out and collecting data, information about permits, maybe information about a house that’s not correct, or taxpayer requests or an interior exterior inspection.
And what we’re going to do is we can get all that information off imagery, oblique imagery from the sky, street-level imagery. There’s all kinds of new technology. We can even collect data from the sky on roof type and siding material, things that we were never able to collect before.
So, why go out and do that, really? It’s not beneficial to us, and it’s not beneficial to them.
So, I’m going to jump back now into AI, and we talked earlier about Tyler has taken a more measured approach to AI, and it’s a little more thoughtful.
How do you plan to move forward with AI and the A&T technology and services? Are we going to be offering something unique to clients that other folks aren’t offering? How are we going to be different, Chris?
Chris Merdon: Again, I think we will advance our technology probably more quickly than our clients are willing to adopt it. So, again, it gets back to sort of meeting our clients where they are. I think we’re mostly focused right now, while our clients are getting more used to AI, I think we’re more focused today on how do we use it internally to more rapidly bring our new clients live. Right? And we talked a little bit about that before with sort of more data conversion tools. So, you know, I think that we’ll continue down that path.
But I think it’s an ongoing continual conversation with our clients of how they see agentic AI integrating into their sort of day-to-day lives.
We talked about the aging workforce. It’s harder and harder for governments to recruit younger people that want to go into public service.
So, I think our focus on AI will be that sort of agentic AI, where do we find opportunities to not necessarily reduce headcount from a cost savings perspective, but it’s how do we deal with the inevitable reduction of government headcount and help them sort of backfill with technology to help them accomplish their business mission.
John Valente: And I think it’s really going to enhance their jobs. They’re going to be more, in a different way, thoughtful about their approaches when it comes to valuation or using agentic AI, which is another part of their lives that they can extend and create a legacy for themselves and say, I’ve tried AI. It’s useful to me, and I’m engaged in it. And I think that’s a wonderful thing for some of the workforce to be able to do.
And in terms of leveraging AI for their benefit, do you think our models that we use, our agentic or our valuation models are going to be easily explained? Are we going to make an effort to do that, to be able to explain things to the public and to the assessors? I know many of them are concerned about that. How can you explain a black box to somebody when all you have is a black box and it spits out numbers?
Chris Merdon: We have to be sensitive to that because the way that we’ve done it in the past is going to change, and we have to bring our clients up to speed on the new methodologies of this data collection. And then we have to make it consumable enough for the end constituent to understand how we arrived at the appraisal.
Ultimately, as you know very well, it changes by jurisdiction how appraisals are done. So, in many of the jurisdictions that we serve, the appraiser is an elected official, reports directly to the constituency.
So, it’s super important for that elected official to be as responsive as possible to their constituents and be able to explain how they arrived at a particular appraisal for their property or in general what the methodologies going to use. So, they’re going to really rely on us to help them develop that communication with constituents and make sure that’s as transparent as possible.
My hope is that it’s so uniform that it becomes obvious. According to the legislative rules of that jurisdiction, I think it becomes a much more uniform, straightforward process that’s easier to explain to constituents.
Mike McFarlane: Chris, I know you have a strong background in public sector and public/private partnerships. Can you share your perspective on the state of public sector policy, specifically with regard to lobbying, and how your leadership style can be incorporated into that where you can help Tyler be as successful as possible?
Chris Merdon: So, you know, lobbying is an interesting topic. It can have somewhat of a negative connotation right off the bat. I will say that Tyler has a perspective on public policy that is built from years and years, decades of experience.
It’s what we do every day. Everybody that works at Tyler is in the public sector. We may not wear a government badge, but all the work that we do is public sector, government oriented. So, we have that perspective, and I think that perspective is really important for our elected officials to hear and for our policymakers to understand how we arrived at that perspective, that can some way, sometimes be communicated directly to elected officials where we have existing relationships, and we have many, and we don’t need to go the lobbying route.
Other times, our voice, we might believe on a particular issue needs to be amplified, and then we can leverage, you know, political consultants or lobbyists to help amplify that. There are other times, though, that Tyler will just take a sit back and wait perspective. You know, we want to sort of see how things progress, and we don’t necessarily need to weigh in on every particular topic. For example, obviously, in Florida is one example where they’re potentially thinking about eliminating property taxes.
You know that that doesn’t require Tyler’s perspective in my opinion. I think we need to let the political process play out. We won’t engage in a lobbying activity on that particular topic. We’ll wait until we see potentially what gets on the ballot, if anything gets on the ballot in Florida, and then let Floridians make their decision.
I think at that time, after a decision is made, that’s the appropriate time for Tyler to maybe step in and help the state manage through whatever decision it is that they made. I’m from Florida. I followed that. I live in Stuart, Florida. I followed the issue pretty closely because it affects me personally. You know, I don’t think that there’s going to be an elimination of property taxes, but I do think there’s going to be a significant legislative change, particularly for homesteads.
So, Tyler will be prepared to let our perspective be known on that. So, you know, I bet as I said before, I’ve been in public sector for 30 years. I’ve used lobbyists all 30 years. I think they can be extremely effective in getting our point across, but it’s not something it’s not a first step go-to thing. It’s sort of sit back, evaluate, figure out if we can communicate directly our perspective. And if not, how do we get some help in doing that?
Mike McFarlane: Very well said. Thank you.
John Valente: And we can kind of be consultants when we’re needed. When they ask us for advice, when they’re interested, we’re there with leadership and some skills and some advancement. That, I think, is our place. And I think that’s what you’re kind of saying. As opposed to us being a pusher, we’re there just to receive. And if somebody asks us our help with anything, whether it’s commercial appraisal valuation or whether it’s with property tax issues or shifts and burdens from commercial to residential, we’re there to help if we’re asked.
Chris Merdon: Absolutely. And, you know, our elected officials need to understand the impact of the decisions that they’re making, and it could just be simply a time perspective. So, we do get some legislative requirements that take a considerable amount of programming time on our part to reprogram our system to meet the latest legislative need. Sometimes the legislature doesn’t give you a whole lot of time. So, you know, that’s a good example where a very minor issue would say, hey, we have to have this implemented in three months. Well, it may take six or nine months for us to do that. So, weighing in on that perspective and just educating the legislature on what system changes need to be made is important.
John Valente: It’s a good place for us to be, and it’s really where our skill set lies.
Mike McFarlane: Okay, Chris. Last one for you. Do you have a long term vision for Appraisal & Tax?
Chris Merdon: I’m developing one. So, I’ve been with Tyler for three months now. I spent the first three months really doing the assessment of where we are, and then now we’ll be spending the next several months sort of figuring out what that vision looks like.
I think there are some very obvious areas that that fall into that vision. One, it was we talked about a number of times on this podcast is really moving from that sort of more labor intensive boots on the ground to a more automated way of doing appraisal. That feels like an obvious one.
I think traditionally Tyler has kind of looked at their two parts of the business separately. You have your appraisal, and then you have your what we call tech or the tax system, the, you know, the Enterprise Appraisal and Tax system. When we go to one uniform platform where both parts of the business are integrated. It if you think about it, it’s the same business. We think about it as two different businesses today, but it really is the same business, just on different parts of the time frame, the spectrum of time. So, bringing that to one uniform platform, I think, is going to be an important piece.
I believe we have to take a more aggressive path on product development, ensuring that our product is the latest and greatest and taking advantage of the latest technology and that we lead our clients down that path and treat our clients individually on that journey and making sure that they’re up to speed on where we’re going with our product, that they that we have an individual path for each client to get to where they want to be on that journey.
I think that’s that that’s certainly a part of the vision, is to not force any client where they don’t want to go, but rather lead them, show by example, communicate the successes our other clients are having, and then making sure that each client is successful in their individual journey.
John Valente: You’re talking about a vision for the future that incorporates AI and technology and education and working with clients. And I think it could be example for other assessors and software solution throughout the country. So, thank you for that.
It’s been a pleasure working with you today and chatting. We really appreciate it so much.
Josh Henderson: As we heard today, modernization is about helping organizations navigate change with a clear vision, a client-first mindset, and a commitment to continuous innovation.
From AI and cloud adoption to the future of property appraisal, Chris shared how government agencies can embrace new opportunities while continuing to deliver trusted services to the residents they serve.
If you’d like to learn more about the topics discussed in this episode, check out the show notes for additional resources. We’d also love to hear your feedback. Fill out the listener survey linked in the notes or reach out anytime at podcast@tylertech.com. And be sure to subscribe, rate, and review the Tyler Tech Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you listen so you never miss an episode.
For Tyler Technologies, I’m Josh Henderson. Thanks for listening to the Tyler Tech Podcast.