Bergen County Clerk: A YEAR OF WORKING THROUGH THE PANDEMIC
It has been nearly a year since the pandemic upended our lives. Closures, restrictions infection rates, masks…Throughout it all, Bergen County Clerk John S. Hogan and his dedicated, determined staff have worked through the challenges of Covid 19 virus and successfully continued to keep the office functioning, yielding impressive results.
With pre-pandemic cross training and contingency plans in place, Clerk Hogan worked with the county administration to secure the necessary technology needed to allow some employees to work from home. This both provided for safety of employees and limited exposure.
As Bergen County’s real estate market began to boom, Clerk Hogan encouraged land record submitters to do so through E-RECORDING, the secure electronic filing of deeds, mortgages, and other land transactions that the clerk successfully initiated in 2014.
Submissions from E-RECORDING increased from 56,057 (46.3%) in 2019 to 65,140 (53.7%) in 2020. It reduced the exposure of the Clerk’s staff from the physical handling of documents. However, with preventative measures in place, another 42,883 documents were still processed manually.