Amherst will upgrade website

Thursday, September 2, 2010

AMHERST – The time has come, town officials agree, to click the main “refresh” button on the town’s website.

And probably the best part, Administrator Gary MacGuire said last week , is all the zippier graphics and fuller content, new interactive links, faster load times and improved ease of navigation will come with no additional cost to taxpayers.

MacGuire said he and selectmen, who have been looking to upgrade the site for several months now, will likely move forward with their most recent plan – putting the update project and the site’s future administrative duties in the hands of its current in-house IT vendor, Microtime Computers Inc., which recently moved to 71 Route 101A.

Since 2004, Rich Hart, a self-employed computer scientist and 30-year town resident, has managed the site on an occasional basis, for which he was paid an hourly stipend but, as MacGuire said, “Rich loved helping out; I doubt he charged (the town) for every hour he devoted to the site.”

Selectmen’s Chairman George Infanti agreed. “Rich has put a ton of time into the site over the years,” Infanti said. “He’s done a great job, but like anyone, he just can’t do everything that needs to be done at this point.”

Besides managing the site, Hart, who worked for Digital Equipment, Compag, and Hewlitt Packard before semi-retiring into self-employment, is a 23-year member of the Conservation Commission and has been on the Planning Board since 2006.

He occasionally teaches computer classes, and is very active with the Souhegan River Local Advisory Committee, often leading canoe tours of the Souhegan and other area rivers. And he can often be found calling contra dances here and there.

MacGuire said that Microtime owner Steve Wolsky, who outlined a preliminary plan for the Website upgrade at last week’s selectmen’s meeting, agreed to upgrade and manage the site as part of his current IT vendor contract with the town.

“I found that the cost to piece the work out would be outrageous,” MacGuire said. “Fortunately, Steve was willing to make this a collaborative effort, and came up with a way to take on the site with no additonal expense to (the town),” he said.

Pinning down a time frame for the rollout of the new site is difficult, MacGuire said, but if the plan moves forward as planned, residents may start noticing some changes about the time they’re buying and carving their Halloween Jack O’Lanterns.

Officials considered self-hosting the new site, MacGuire said, but soon thought better of it. “There’s a lot to it, probably too much for us to handle right,” he said.

Until now, a firm named Bluehost has hosted the site, but with the upgrade will come a new host, GoDaddy, MacGuire said.

The only part of the project the town will have to pay for is the initial programming and construction of the new site, which will be done by one of Wolsky’s specialized vendors. That cost, MacGuire said, will be covered by funds that formerly paid Hart’s stipend.

Another spoke in the wheel is a planned upgrade to the e-mail system used by town employees as well as members of boards and commissions. In many cases, the current site lists officials’ or volunteers’ home e-mails with their contact information, leading to repeated requests that the town adopt a system of standardized e-mail addresses based on a town account.

MacGuire said he believes that can be accomplished by instituting a Microsoft Outlook, or similar, account, which he plans to pursue.

Dean Shalhoup can be reached at 673-3100 ext. 31 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.