Gettysburg web site modeled after Emmitsburg’s

(2/21) Gettysburg’s new town government web site should look very familiar to Emmitsburg residents.

“I basically built it on the foundation of the Emmitsburg government web site,” said Mike Hillman.

Hillman designed Emmitsburg’s web site back in 2001 and it was based on the design for Cumberland, Maryland’s town government.

Hillman was contacted last year about helping newly-elected Gettysburg Councilman John Butterfield and his wife Judith redesign the borough’s web site for its planning and zoning department.

“He was up here the next day sitting down at the computer and looking at the web site,” said Judith Butterfield.

Hillman listened to what the Butterfields wanted and sent them a number of government web site’s to visit.

“Emmitsburg town government’s was the most functional and easiest to maintain,” Hillman said.

The Butterfields agreed and Hillman redesigned the planning and zoning web site in the same format. He also included some new tools he had that weren’t available in the construction of Emmitsburg’s web site.

“They (the Butterfields) showed this to the mayor and staff and the next thing was they said, ‘Let’s just put the whole web site in this design,’” Hillman said.

So the entire web site was redone and launched last month. Hillman also taught Judith the things she needed to know in order to keep it up to date in the same way Emmitsburg town staff keeps the Emmitsburg site up to date.

“Michael will buzz in here for two hours and when he leaves, I know how to do six new things,” Judith said.

“Everytime I did something, I brought up the Emmitsburg web site as this is how you need to do it,” Hillman said.

When John took on the web site project, he assured the town council, it wouldn’t cost the taxpayers anything. With Hillman’s help, John cut the costs for the web site by two-thirds and got much more space.

Now the Butterfields are even looking at how Emmitsburg keeps its meeting minutes because they have found them easier to use and more useful than the way Gettysburg keeps its minutes.