By Ruth Melville

At the Economic Development Commission (EDC) meeting on April 12, Bill Brown presented the first look at the newly redesigned town website.

Although the website underwent a major overhaul two years ago, there were many features of the site that were not working as well in practice as had been hoped. So last year, the EDC set up a committee, comprising Mary Fanette, Sue Frisch and chair Bill Brown, to oversee a redesign of the redesign.

In presenting the new website to the EDC, Brown said the committee had wanted the redesign “to reflect the character of the town and to simplify the presentation of information. We wanted to make it cleaner, brighter, more pleasing to the eye.” To that end, the committee hired Jim Jasper, of Jasper Design, an experienced website builder for nonprofits. The new tagline for the website is “Norfolk: A Place Apart.”

Brown and Jasper presented a few sample pages, and at first glance the redesign does look both more attractive and easier to navigate than the previous version.

In the top left of the home page, there are tabs for Living (which links to copy written by Michael Kelly), Visiting, and Views (which links to a photo gallery). Under the main photo, which will change throughout the year, there is a link for Upcoming Events, and then links to Community News (which include notices and municipal meetings), Norfolk Now, and a visitors’ map.

There are some nice features inside the site as well. For example, the directory of town organizations has links to each organization’s own website. On the calendar page, which can be checked by the week or by the month, a user can import events into his or her personal computer’s calendar.

A town website necessarily performs a dual function: to provide information for residents and to market the town to outsiders. One purpose of the redesign was to make information for both visitors and residents easily accessible throughout the site.

The website redesign and construction were funded by the Coalition for Sound Growth, and the budget includes money for a site editor. Some further tinkering with the site will allow for the submission of information for the calendar and directory. Still to be implemented is a marketing program to drive traffic to the site.

The new website is expected to go live sometime this month.