Hernando Today
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Brooksville Unveils New Web Site
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Published: September 5, 2008
BROOKSVILLE - The city's Web site is sporting more than a facelift.
The virtual portal to Brooksville government has been transformed - and with free software that could help the county save money, too.
The site, www.ci.brooksville.fl.us, has been redesigned with the help of the county's information technologies department using Joomla, a software system used by organizations ranging from the United Nations to MTV Networks.
Though much more modestly sized, the advantages for Brooksville's Web site are clear, City Manager Jennene Norman-Vacha said.
"It's much cleaner, much crisper," she said.
While the new site is currently comprised mainly of material from the former site, "Our goal is to put more information that serves a purpose and provides new information to our citizens and anyone interested in Brooksville," she said.
Joomla is a good way to do it, said Susan Wahl, Web administrator for the county, who worked on the city's site. The city hired the county earlier this year to provide IT support.
Joomla is a so-called content management system that helps site developers keep track of every piece of content on a Web site, "much like your local public library keeps track of books and stores them," according to the Joomla's own site. Content can be text, photos, music, video or documents, and it's easy to master with very little training, Wahl said.
That will allow department heads in the city to manage their own pages without funneling information through a Web master, a process that can be inefficient and costly. Brooksville never had a Web master, so the efforts of inexperienced staffers to post content resulted in a clunky site with many links that led to dead ends.
"It's a whole lot easier to manage now," Wahl said.
More important, Joomla offers an intuitive design that's more user-friendly and easier to navigate for visitors, Wahl said.
Among the new features is an events calendar on the main page, and a poll will survey residents on issues that matter to them, Norman-Vacha said. The test poll for the site launch asks residents to rate their garbage service.
The new site is a sight for Councilmember Lara Bradburn's sore eyes. Bradburn has long lamented the city's former Web site that she called "an embarrassment."
"The new design really gives the city a more positive image, and it's going to help us tremendously to better communicate with the public," Bradburn said.
Open source means savings for taxpayers
The open source movement is being driven by "regular geeks that are tuned into contributing just for improving the Internet," said Garry Allen, director of the county's IT department.
"There are a lot of people out there who feel that software should be free, and you shouldn't have to sell your soul to Microsoft," Allen said.
That philosophy could be a boon to governments looking to save money. Many already are - the cities of Boulder, Colo., and Longwood here in Florida are using Joomla, for example.
Hernando County is already using an open source software similar to Microsoft Word, Allen said. Putting Word on every county computer would be cost prohibitive, but the open source equivalent works just about as well so far, he said.
The Brooksville Web launch using Joomla will help Allen and his staff decide if that software could be right for at least some of the county's Web site needs, he said.
"It gave us an opportunity to experiment with this, gain some experience and evaluate the product," he said.
Reporter Tony Marrero can be reached at 352-544-5286 or lmarrero@hernandotoday.com.
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