Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — In a few months, visitors to the Routt County Web site will be only a click away from an improved Web site.

Routt County commissioners Tuesday approved a contract to redesign the county's current Web site.

"What we're doing here is improving Routt County's presence on the Internet," County Commissioner Dan Ellison said.

The Routt County Web site averages 75 hits daily, said Mo Valenta, the Routt County Geographic Information Systems analyst who headed the committee to approve a developer to redesign the site.

Valenta and county commisioners expect to see that number increase as people are made aware of what the new site has to offer.

The developer will work with individual departments to come up with a consistent site, Ellison said.

Individual departments in the past have contributed their own links to the Web site, making it difficult for Internet users to find the information they want, County Commissioner Doug Monger said.

"This isn't a total fix," Monger said. "We're making the site consistent so it won't be so confusing to those who visit our site."

After a final design is approved in late August, database tables and content from the old site will be transferred to the new site.

"We will take our existing content and move it to a more dynamic Web page," Valenta said.

New information about the airport and employment will be posted on the new site to meet the high number of calls to the county about flights and job openings.

Job seekers will also be able to download job applications on the Internet, as well as absentee ballots and voter registration applications.

Kathryn Antyr, a local Web developer who heads Studio9-Design, was selected to do the project.

A December deadline was first proposed by Valenta and the rest of the committee, but Antyr expects to finish the redesign by Oct. 1.

Commissioners appreciate the local ties that Antyr will bring to the job.

It was necessary to hire an outside source because the county has the resources but not the time to complete the redesign, Monger said.

"She (Antyr) has the ability to focus her efforts on this single task using state-of-the-art technology," he said. "This will allow staff to consistently update information on the new site in the future."