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Home My WebLink AboutAgenda - 04-24-2007-7bORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT Meeting Date: April 24, 2007 Action Agenda Item No. 7 - b_ SUBJECT: Report on Website Evolution Project DEPARTMENT: Information Technology PUBLIC HEARING: (Y/N) No ATTACHMENT(S): INFORMATION CONTACT: Presentation on Website Evolution Todd Jones, 245-2285 PURPOSE: To inform the Board of County Commissioners of an Information Technologies initiative to improve the Orange County Website. BACKGROUND: The Orange County website (http://www.co.orange.nc.us) has steadily grown since its inception in 1996. The growth of the website was initially driven by individual departments working informally with the Information Technologies department in creating new content and services to address their customers' needs. While this process ensured each department was able to tailor their websites to their constituent communities, there was no overarching website strategy or formal web authoring standards to manage the growth over time. Several proposed initiatives were considered by the BOCC and the IT Advisory Committee to overhaul the website, the most comprehensive of which was put forth in February of 2001. This initiative, which was estimated to cost $137,796, would have involved the state's Information Technology Services (ITS) in a .wholesale redesign of the County's website. At that time, the County's website was 77Megabytes in size. In comparison, today's Orange County website is 2.2 Gigabytes in size (an increase of 2800%), as driven by enhanced content and new web services. While the ITS proposal was not funded, the issues that drove it have since remained unaddressed. Over the past year, the Information Technologies department has worked with departmental web administrators in a collaborative effort to address issues resulting from the historically ad hoc evolution of the County's website. Progress to Date Information Technologies, with input from departmental web administrators, has developed a template, identified software tools, created processes and established a support system for addressing the issues of the web site. Information Technologies staff, with departmental web administrators and input from the UNC's School of Information and Library Sciences, have worked to re-architect the County's web information into a service based framework. Statistics • We have converted 17 departmental web sites over to the new template. • We are in the process of finalizing 7 additional departmental web sites. • We have initiated the planning stages of converting one other departmental website.. • We designed and implemented SmartSearch, a targeted search engine that now handles two-thirds of all web searches on the County's website. Results The public now benefits from the improved web pages in the following ways: • Accessibility -New web pages are compliant with accessibility standards established by the ADA, the World Wide Web consortium and other standards bodies for web design. The new pages load quickly, even on dial-up lines, and information can be translated from English to other languages efficiently when citizens use 3~d party automated translation tools. Unified design -New web pages follow a consistent and controlled design standard, which helps the public locate information and services efficiently and reliably. Navigation is the same from department to department. Colors, fonts and layout are consistent across departments using the template and toolset. This consistency also helps establish a brand identity. Central control of style -New web pages reference a small set of files, called "style sheets" that define the pages' appearance, such as colors, fonts, placement of elements and other attributes of the web pages' look and feel. The style of the website can be changed quickly and easily throughout all new web pages with simple changes to these central style sheets. • Efficient update mechanism -The combination of the authoring tool set, template, authoring policies, and technical support ensures that departments can easily maintain their information with minimal training. By putting content maintenance in the hands of departmental experts, they can more efficiently and directly maintain their information. Department experts can focus directly on the information, not on the web coding or the design elements, both of which are managed by the Information Technologies department. Service orientation -The new template and authoring policies are designed to yield web pages that are organized by services, rather than reflecting the internal organizational structure. This allows the public to find what they need very quickly. It also positions the County well for web-based services that cut across departmental boundaries. Next Steps After the completion of all outstanding departments' web pages, the next steps are to: • Create cross-departmental service pages (e.g., how to build a house, seek assistance from social service agencies, access the County's wide range of environmental initiatives) • Update the style based on public, Commissioner and staff feedback • Revamp the opening page FINANCIAL IMPACT: The improvements to date have been done using existing staff and software resources. With the work being. performed in-house, departments feel a stronger sense of ownership of their data and are trained in the technologies and processes used in maintaining information. The estimated cost to outsource an equivalent redesign of a website of the County's magnitude ranges from $100K to $500K, based on current market rates: RECOMMENDATION: The Manager recommends that the Board recognize the efforts of County staff toward restructuring and unifying the Orange County website for all visitors, while doing so at minimal expense. ',a ti~. Website (R)evolution # Council of Webmasters - Formed in 2004 by IT initiative - Open to all departments - Composed of departmental webmasters & IT staff - Working on Orange County web issues of common interest - Grass roots effort to improve Orange County's web presence 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 2 O 1 0 ,. Website (R)evolution * Council of Webmasters - Initially gathered to discuss common problems and issues with webpages and website - Consensus emerged that there were overarching problems with the existing website: • Accessibility obstacles • Consistency between departments • Out of date information • No central controls for efficient site-wide management • Navigation not optinvzed Ino/zoo? Orange County IT 3 Website (R)evolution #Website Redesign Initiative - New template & toolset available to all departments, developed and supported by IT -Consistent navigation and branding - Centrally managed look and feel - Accessibility compliance - Service oriented, less departmentally structured - Software, process and support to minimize information maintenance effort 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 4 2 Website (R)evolution ___ ____ * Accomplishments to date: - Smart Search implementation - 17 departments' websites converted to new template - 7 departments' websites undergoing conversion - 1 department's website in conversion planning 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 5 ._ Website (R)evolution * Next steps - Bring remaining departments onboard - Develop more cross-department services pages, e.g., • Newcomers to Orange County • Building a house • Seeking public assistance • Guide to Orange County environmental initiatives - eGovernment portal -Redesign front page -Refine overall look and feel 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 6 O 3 Website (R)evolution #Ultimate Goal is to produce a complete web platform that will: -Support public needs - Convey professional branding - Be easy to maintain - Allow growth with technology & web trends - Serve additional web service needs - Be accessible to all members of the public 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 7 Questions? 1/10/2007 Orange County IT 8 0 4