City Set to Spend $385,000 to Overhaul Website

Things change quickly in the digital age.

So by today's standards, the city's content management system—which is used to run the gaithersburgmd.gov website—is ancient.

Created in-house in 1998, the system, officials say, is ready for an overhaul.

The city has set aside $385,000 for the new system and website, which is expected to be delivered after seven to 10 months.

The city received 13 bids for a new content management system (CMS) and website design work last October.

"The review committee narrowed the selection to 4 finalists and conducted product demonstrations. Based on the demonstrations, the committee determined that the Sitecore CMS was the best software to meet the City’s needs," staff reported to the Council.

But none of the finalists met the exact specifications of what the city was looking for, so City Manager Angel Jones told staff to end the request for proposals process and "direct negotiation in the best interest of the City was authorized."

The city ultimately chose Siteworx, Inc., of Reston, VA.

According to the company's website, they have done work for Strayer University, AOL, the U.S. House of Representatives, MTV and PayPal, among others.

Siteworx estimated that the work could be done for $300,000, with an additional $50,000 for software. The city added on ten percent, or $35,000, as contingency funds.

"The project is an integral part of the City’s emphasis on transparency and communication, and has been given a very high priority in the City Manager’s strategy to enhance our efforts in these areas," said the city's Director of Communication Britta Monaco. "We are very much looking forward to taking advantage of the website’s new features to increase our dialog with those who live and work here."

But exactly what that new website will look like and do is still somewhat undecided.

All the current content will be migrated to the new system—nothing will be lost or deleted.

But the city has posted a survey on the current site asking for the public's input on what they find useful, how the use the Web page and what changes they'd like made.

The link to the survey can be found here.

At their work session on July 12, the Mayor and City Council will have an interview with the contractor.