Jim Condos, the Vermont Secretary of State, unveiled a new website for his office this week. The old website was clunky, outmoded and difficult to use.
“The goal was to make it easier for the public to find the resources they need. I feel we have accomplished this by creating a website that is user friendly and intuitive,” Condos said in a statement.
Condos initiated the overhaul project shortly after he took office in 2011.
Some of his agency’s information frameworks were so old they were “in danger of failing,” he has said. Some pages of the website showed outdated information about corporations, for example, but the site’s content management systems had morphed so much over time that the pages were no longer accessible for updates. He has said the new website will improve public access to state information and will result in better staff efficiency.
Other state agencies, including the State Treasurer’s office, the Department of Taxes, the Department of Finance and Management, the Department of Human Resources and the Department of Motor Vehicles, have also been engaged in costly tech revamps over the last several years.
The state spent more than $80 million on upgrades to technology systems as of late 2012.
In the last several years, the Department of Vermont Health Access has spent $66 million on Vermont’s health care exchange system.
The Secretary of State’s corporations and elections system projects will cost about $5 million and will be funded by federal grants and fees. The improvements will take several more years to fully complete. The cost estimate does not include upgrades to the Vermont State Archives and Records Administration.
PCC Technology Group LLC based in Bloomfield, Conn., was contracted to develop the corporations division’s database and online registration tools for businesses. The cost of the project was $2.2 million.
The new website does not yet include a planned elections administration platform, which is now underway. Earlier this year PCC signed a 10-year contract worth $2.8 million for the second project.
Condos says the elections administration platform will offer real-time elections results in the 2016 election and up-to-date campaign finance data starting this summer.
The Secretary of State’s office handles a wide array of official business for the state, including elections, licensure of corporations and professional occupations and the state’s archives.
The new website is designed to make it easier for Vermonters to register a business, apply for a professional license, find a justice of the peace, register to vote, or file a complaint against an accountant or dentist.
It is also a tool for researchers who want to get information about businesses in Vermont, lobbyist disclosure documents or archived election results.
“Really, what it all comes down to is transparency,” Condos said in a statement. “My hope is that the new site will make more information more clearly accessible to Vermonters.”
