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• Redesign committee

• Contact Terry Kearns

This isn't the redesign; it's about the redesign.

• We have a public form here.  It's the place for you submit your ideas and suggestions.
• We've added a private forum for the MLPA board here.
• We haven't started any new pages yet but we'll let you know right here.
• And we've added a search:   Would you like to search the MLPA site?

This is a work in process.  A place to hash out the idea.  If you have questions, comments, answers, or ideas about our redesign, please check out our redesign forum.

The goals

• Increase membership
• Allow folks to join MLPA online with a credit card 
• Provide useful and timely information to the community
• Provide a searchable archive of MLPA information
• Allow non-technical folks to publish
• Develop processes for publishing and managing the site
• Don't spend too much money or require too many resources
• Have a site we can be proud of

Current state

• Here is the current site.  Here is a proposed site.
• The webmaster job is transient and it's difficult to find folks with the skills to take it on.
• The original designer no longer maintains the site.
• The webmaster is the only one who can publish.
• There's neither a process or tradition of maintaining the site.
• There is an excellent e-mail list and process for sending e-mail updates to the membership.
• There is a practical membership data base in Excel that also contains "the whole neighborhood," members and non-members, and contains information about Security Patrol enrollment
• There is a separate data base for the Security Patrol

Suggested improvements

• Current community calendar
• Meeting minutes and other official communications
• Committee reports
• Fundamental neighborhood information,
  • Political boundaries, elected officials, tax districts
  • Polling places
  • Schools
  • City services
  • Neighborhood boundaries
  • Parks
  • Tree ordinances
  • Sidewalk repaving
  • Work at home rules
  • Neighborhood clubs and organizations (scouts, sports, garden clubs, etc.)
  • Security patrol
• News and events that affect the neighborhood
• Details about neighborhood events.
• Member only services
  • Q&A forums
  • Parent resources

Ongoing human resource requirements (right now the webmaster performs almost all of these jobs)

Technical talent: (one person can do all three jobs)

• At least one person who understands the technical part of publishing at least enough to deal with the hosting vendor
• At least one person who has a great feel for the end-user and the overall site experience
• At least one person who is organized and likes to communicate with the community

Design and implementation jobs (with the help of a vendor):

• Manage the implementation project, deal with vendors, budget, requirements, proposals, approvals, budget, etc.
• Develop a data model  (What do you want to publish?  Who will create and publish it)
• Specify the legal transactions  (What can users do?)
• Structure the site into pages that call each other  (How will your users use the site and how will you make sure that they can?)
• Implement the site
• Train the content providers, editors, and publishers

Content jobs:

• authors create the content
• editors manage and approve the content
• publishers decide what and when to publish
• information designers (by the vendor)
• graphic designers (by the vendor except for special event pages)
• programmers (by the vendor)
• moderators for forums, if any

Administration jobs:

• Overall management and reporting to the board
• Managing permissions and password
• Scheduling content and encouraging authors and editors
• Managing workflow
• Preparing a budget, getting the funds, and paying the bills
• Marketing the site (you want folks to know about how cool your site is)
• Responding to emails and other queries (customer support)
• Managing online membership payments
• Managing job turnover and training

Marketing

• Get the word out
• Attract existing and non-members to the site
• Incent non-members to join and existing members to stay
• Provide added benefits to members
• Provide added benefits for joining online.
• Enlist support of neighborhood merchants and professionals
• Measure the success of the site by visitors, membership and anecdotes.

Next steps

• Provide a way for the web team manage the research and proposals
• Visit other Neighborhood websites.
• Talk with vendors' customers.
• Research potential vendors such as DreamMaker Studios
• Talk with vendors' customers
• Talk with other neighborhood webmasters
• Determine prices of basic and add-on services; start-up and ongoing costs
• Prepare written requirements / proposal / discussion documents
• Discuss plans, options, and progress with MLPA leadership
• Plan next steps