Dear Editor:

On Sept 15, 1998, the joint Rhinebeck Town-Village Technology Committee initiated a website with the following goals:

provide Rhinebeck residents with one source for  government information; help overcome the confusion many have about the different roles of the village and town governments; have it be a truly shared service funded by all Rhinebeck residents via their town taxes.

The “rhinebeck-ny.gov” domain name was obtained to be used by both municipalities for the joint website and employee email addresses.  The “.gov” indicated it was owned by an official governmental organization.

Using volunteer help, the website grew to become a useful, user friendly reference for the community.

Subsequently, former town Supervisor Steve Block instigated a redesign using a new user interface and organization. The service-oriented user interface was replaced by a municipality and departmental oriented interface. 

After the switch to the new website, municipal employees, not volunteers, were to update of the site.  Then Rhinebeck Village decided to terminate its participation in the joint website and subcontracted out the development of a totally new web.

Now, 14 years after the initial web site debuted we find: village taxpayers now pay for two websites, town and village; the single source of information with one integrated interface is gone.

Time to cut the waste!  On March 20, elect Brenda Klaproth and Homer “Knick” Staley to the Village Board. 

Continued...

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PAUL E. NIEDERCORN

Rhinebeck

pauln@prodigy.net

 

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