City’s website, contact information changing

 

BY PRU SOWERS

KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER

 

Key West’s public face is getting a face lift.

The city’s website, formally located on the Internet at www.keywestcity.com, can now be found at www.cityofkeywest.fl-gov. And Internet contact information used to send emails to city employees also changed as of Dec. 18, with all emails now replaced with the new website address. For example, if you want to email City Manager Jim Scholl, instead of [email protected], you now use jscholl@keywest-fl-gov.

Key West Information Technology Director Patti McLauchlin said the old email address used the first initial of a staff member’s name plus the first six letters of their last name. Now, the whole last name can be used, making it easier for anyone wanting to contact a city employee, she said.

“I finally get my whole name in there after all these years,” she laughed.

The reason for changing the Internet URL to cityofkeywest-fl.gov was to more accurately reflect Key West as a municipality. And the new URL also mirrors Monroe County’s Internet address, which is www.monroecounty-fl.gov.

“That’s who we are, the city of Key West. It [new URL] portrays us more as a city,” McLauchlin said.

The city’s website itself is also undergoing a revamping. A new website design will be rolled out in the next six to eight weeks, said McLauchlin. The reason behind the new design is to make it more user-friendly and to re-size it for smartphone and IPad devices. Right now, calling up the website on a smartphone cuts off some of each page, forcing users to toggle back and forth to see all the information on each page.

“When you go on an IPad or a smartphone, you’ll see it just as you do on your computer,” McLauchlin said about the new design. “We’re a 24-hour, seven day a week city. That’s how we should present the information to you.”

The new website will also have direct, one-button links to at least six of the most frequently used pages on the site’s homepage. Those information pages, which currently require a bit of hunting and pecking to find, include online bill payment, meeting agendas for city boards and commissions, contact information for city employees, municipal codes and online services.

The new website design will not change greatly from what is currently in use, McLaughlin said. The colors may change a bit, but it will still use a rotating series of photos of Key West to anchor the home page. And a monthly calendar of events will still be on the homepage. The new design is being developed by McLauchlin and her IT team.

“We don’t have a whole lot of money, but it’s fine. It’s a work in progress,” she said.

 

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