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County's New Website Automatically Archives All Content - Permanently!
Madison County, Tennesse recently launched their new website, www.co.madison.tn.us, to better serve and communicate with citizens.

Partnering with CivicPlus, the nation's leading e-government website development company, the County's website has undergone a complete overhaul - from the user interface to the back-end administration - that has successfully enhanced the citizen-government experience.

A County On the Cutting Edge of Content Archiving 

From the perspective of open records and the Freedom of Information Act, the highlight of the County's new website is the automatic archiving feature of their content management system (CMS) - which was provided by CivicPlus. The County is able to designate how long to archive content and when, or if, it should be deleted.

"Throughout the website's development, Deputy Mayor Tony White and I had many discussions on how long we should set the CMS to archive our content," said Website Administrator Terry Stroud. "Initially we had decided on three years, but upon further discussion we decided to permanently archive all content."

With the CivicPlus CMS's dynamic archiving system, every edit that is made to their website is automatically archived. This means if requested, the County can do point-in-time retrieval and deliver exactly what was on their website at that point in time.

Easy on the Eyes and Full of Functionality

From the citizen's perspective, the new website features a striking design that compliments its' intuitive navigation and directs visitors directly to the information they need. With one click from the homepage a visitor can:

• Pay bills online
• Report a concern to Code Enforcement, Parks and Rec, County Mayor and others 
• Sign-up for email notifications of job postings, bid postings and news announcements 
• View emergency alerts and detailed information

 
Access a searchable archive center of County Commission meeting minutes and agendas
In addition, the County has added the "Share" feature on every page. This feature allows site visitors to easily share their favorite pages or articles using social bookmarking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Digg and others.

Using their new CMS, County staff can maintain every aspect of the website from pages to online forms, news announcements to an archive center. It also allows the Website Administrator to delegate site maintenance to staff throughout the County; a process that ensures every corner of the website remains up-to-date with the most current information.

Serving citizens and improving workflow are not the only benefits the website has provided the County. CivicPlus has purchased BEF Carbon Offsets from the Bonneville Environmental Foundation, guaranteeing the energy that powers Madison County's website is offset 100% by investing in clean, renewable energy.

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