The City Of Laramie Launches a New User Friendly Website

Technology wise, today is an exciting day for the City of Laramie as they launch a brand new website. Not only does the new site look great, but it is also much more user friendly and has some great new functionality. Information Technology manager, Jonathan Rhoades, says the general layout will make it easier to find information, which was a common complaint with the old website. In general the site seems to be much more relevant than what the old site had to offer and that is really nice to see.  

There are a few big icons on the left hand side of the home page that give some handy resources for people to use. "Notify Me" allows you to subscribe to City of Laramie e-mails that deal with anything from alerts about emergencies to job postings. The nice thing is you can select exactly what you want to avoid spam in your inbox.

You can also easily pull up individual city maps showing roads, parks, historic sites, property zoning, or city council wards. I was unaware that the city had a "CodeRED" system, but now it is prominent on the home page of the new site. "CodeRED" is a phone alert system that the city introduced back in February of this year. Here is how the system works:

The City of Laramie has contracted with Emergency Communications Network, Inc., of Ormond Beach, Florida, for its "CodeRED" high-speed telephone emergency notification services. In the event of a natural or manmade emergency event, the CodeRED system gives City and County officials the ability to deliver pre-recorded emergency telephone notification/information messages to targeted areas or the entire city and county at a rate of up to 60,000 calls per hour.CodeRED allows us to notify you via hard line phone, cell phone, text message, or email, in the event of an emergency.  We can't be sure that your number and address are in the database.  To ensure that your information is in the database, you need to “ready-up” using the the link provided below.  By enrolling in the CodeRED database, you will be providing multiple methods of contact if the need arises.  This is particularly important if you have a cell phone, high-speed internet phone, or Voice over internet protocol (VoIP) phone.  Providing an email address allows us to contact you via that medium.

You can enroll in the CodeRED system HERE to ensure that you get alerts.

Overall the city's new website has a lot to offer so go check it out! The flip will occur at 8 a.m. on Friday, but Rhoades says the old site may still appear for some people until later in the day as the launch is completed.

CivicPlus, a company from Manhattan, Kansas, redesigned the site and will provide maintenance, support and hosting services. Their $50,000 proposal was approved by the Laramie City Council in April. CivicPlus also worked with the City of Green River on their municipal website.