By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

A new website for the city of Hays went live last week.

Information Technology Director Chad Ruder presented an overview of the update to the Hays City Commission at its meeting Thursday night.

Ruder was quick to credit Jessi Jacobs, the city’s website designer in the IT Department.

Ruder first showed pictures of the website’s evolution. He was assigned to create the first website for Hays when he was hired late in 2000.

“This thing was top-shelf,” Ruder said tongue-in-cheek. “It had flashing lights for the police department. It had trees that waved for the parks department. It had scrolling marquees along the bottom.”

Commissioners could be heard laughing good-naturedly at Ruder’s description.

“Everything was great until wiser heads prevailed and they decided I needed to work on computers and they hired someone who had some design ability. That’s when Jessi Jacobs was hired,” Ruder said.

The website has gone through several iterations over the past 18 years, with newest design going live Monday.

Going from the original $300 piece of software to a modern system, Ruder said it’s no longer just the IT Department running the website.

“The departments themselves are going to take over maintenance of the website,” he said.

A committee of department representatives came up with two goals for the new design. The site should be informational and current, with an intuitive layout for contributors to easily navigate.

The IT Department also wanted to be able to track analytics, the site should to be ADA-compliant, and it should be easy to view on different sized screens.

Most important, Ruder said, is content management.

“IT will administer the back end and make sure everything works well, but the departments will take care of posting their information,” he said.

He gave an example of City Finance Director Kim Rupp being able to post audio of the city commission meeting “in his time frame, not ours. We’ve always done our best but when you have all the post requests coming to IT, it doesn’t always match their time frame.”

Departments also wanted the ability for a more specific “granular” information search on the website and to post forms.

The new website has more information about the city, which may mean the public can get their questions answered online and not have to make a phone call to a city office.

“We love to speak to the citizens but if there’s something that they can do — finding information quickly in the evening on their mobile device — that’s where we were looking,” Ruder said. “Citizens want current information, they want forms and calendars, they want city news and they want to pay their bills online.”

The new home page features mega-menus at the top. They’re based on government website design trends and research by the Hays IT Department of what people want.

“The ‘How Do I?’ is, in my opinion, the most important,” Ruder said. “It drops down and gives you options.”

Scrolling down the home page brings up City News, with two sections, News Flash and a carousel of important information. Currently, those topics are water conservation and the North Vine Street Improvement Project.

The new website has more than 200 pages.

Ruder pointed to the “Agenda Center,” as something “we’re very proud of.”

“Not only are agendas posted but later on you’ll be able to click on audio from the city commission meeting and access the minutes,” he said.

He showed a form created by the parks department for submitting a tree rebate request to the city.

“It’s so nice. It doesn’t matter what time of day,” Ruder noted. “Residents can do things at their own pace. The information is accurate because they type it in themselves, and the parks department receives it.”

One module of the website will replace the current Nixle notification system used by the city.

“Rather than a blanket opt-in, ‘Notify Me’ gives citizens the ability to sign up via text and email for unique things that catch their interest, such as public safety, road closures, and bid notifications,” Ruder said. There’s also an Emergency Alert as well as calendar events, any news flash, and any agendas for city boards.

“We feel we’re going to get more subscribers because people will get what they want to hear about,” he said.

Ruder told the commission the city will keep using Nixle for a short time as it transitions to the new “Notify Me” and advises residents of the change.

The Hays website address remains the same – www.haysusa.com.