Canfield’s new website goes live

Staff report

CANFIELD

A new year brings a new look for the city’s website, now found at Canfield.gov.

The revamped website went live Feb. 2, said City Manager Wade Calhoun. Upgrades include “virtual city hall” features such as online payments for utility bills and mayor’s court, an emergency text-alert system and, in the future, online facilities rentals, he said.

“What the website is now is a design with a lot of the old content from the old site. Now that the site’s live, we’re enhancing the functionality and adding more relevant content to each section of the website,” Calhoun said.

City officials budgeted the website for 2018 and spent that summer meeting with design firms, which wanted prices ranging from $10,000 to $30,000, Calhoun said. The city awarded the work to Canfield-based 45 Press, which offered a package with enhancements for about $13,000.

The website will soon link up with the rest of the Canfield community – Canfield schools, Cardinal Joint Fire District and the police department, through which residents can request house watches and leave anonymous tips. Also planned is a business-oriented “Discover Canfield” section, which will include links to Canfield businesses and a shop locator.

Visitors to Canfield.gov can sign up for regular email blasts or leave their cellphone number to receive text alerts for emergency incidents such as water-main breaks or road closures, which can be aimed by users’ registered addresses.

“There’s some things we’re going to focus on, using the website as an active communication tool [more] than we have in the past,” Calhoun said.