A Robust Resident Engagement Platform for Roswell, GA

The City also wanted its code of ordinances and unified development code online and in the same place. With CivicPlus^® (formerly Municode), the City enhanced its digital offerings to give the public a single, trusted, digital location for all their community resources and information.

Before partnering with CivicPlus, the City of Roswell only maintained physical copies of its code of ordinances. That meant that the only way for Roswell residents to access the City’s code of ordinances and related documents was to travel to city hall or fill out a request for a physical copy. Many people did not have the time to make the trip to City Hall and if they did put in a request, it could take several days until it was fulfilled. Staff had a difficult time with the hard copies too, as they were stuck in file cabinets or shelves and could not be searched, as something on the web could. Another issue lied in the fact that these would have to be scanned if being sent electronically.

Realizing the need to host their documents and code online, the city sought the assistance of Municode Codification’s Online Code Hosting solution and MuniDocs feature. When searching for a document archival tool, it was important that multiple documents could be uploaded at once. MuniDocs allows this and Roswell now hosts over 7,500 documents. These documents also have optical character recognition (OCR) applied automatically to meet some ADA standards.

OCR aids in the searching of documents, which can be done through the platform’s search bar. This search bar also works with the code of ordinances and unified development code, allowing for simple navigation between the three. online code hosting utilizes some unique features to further increase transparency such as recent changes, pending amendments, and previous versions. The date of the last update is also displayed before seeing the full code, ensuring the community knows that they are seeing the most recent version. Sharing is simple within the platform as well and includes options to send a link, print, download, or email.

Click here for codificationfor more information about Municode Codification services from CivicPlus