A village square on a summer afternoon, the bandstand in the foreground with hydrangeas along its rail and the brick storefronts of the main street across the green.

Township and village websites

Municipal website design for the question asked at nine at night.

Most of what a township office is asked in a week is the same handful of questions, every one of them already has a written answer, and almost none of those answers are anywhere a resident can find after the office closes. Municipal website design, for us, is putting them there: the site, the notices and the search, built and run for townships and villages across northern Illinois.

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Rockford · Northern Illinois · The Chicago suburbs

After the office closes

Six questions get asked after the office closes.

Tick what your website answers today, and read what a resident sees at nine at night with your township's name on it. Every question left open is a phone call on Monday morning, to the same person who answered it last week.

What a resident sees

Your townshipTownship office, northern Illinois

0 of six answered without a call

Appeal deadline, this year's, with the formCall the assessor
Exemptions, one page eachNot on the site
Next meeting, with the agendaLast year's calendar
Road district, with a formA number that rings the hall
FOIA, one pageBuried in a PDF
Open Friday until 4 PMHours might differ

Every line in gray is a call on Monday morning. What we build for townships

Which one of these is you?

Six things we hear from township supervisors, clerks and assessors, and one of them is usually the reason you are reading this.

That is the whole problem, not a detail

Most township sites we are shown were built once by somebody who has moved on, in something nobody on staff can log into. So the hours are wrong, the officials are wrong, and the last news post is from three years ago. A site the clerk can update in a browser is worth more than a handsome one nobody can touch, and for everything past what the clerk should have to do there is ongoing support rather than a hunt for whoever built it.

How we build sites

Because the deadline is not a page

Assessment notices go out, the clock starts, and every resident who opens one has the same three questions. Those are three pages, written once, updated once a year, findable from a search. The calls that are left are the ones that actually need the assessor.

The pages that do the answering

Then say so, and say where to go

Residents do not know which level of government holds what, and they should not have to. A township site that explains the split in plain words and links straight through to the county lookup takes the call without taking on the record. We have seen township pages come up for county-level tax and assessor searches doing exactly that.

How the pages get found

Posting is not the same as findable

The Open Meetings Act says where a notice has to go and how long before. It does not say the agenda has to be a scanned photocopy in a folder three clicks down. Notices, agendas, minutes and the budget belong in one predictable place with a date on each, so nobody has to take your word that it was posted.

How we structure a site

For a public body that is not a nice-to-have

A government site has obligations a shop does not, and most township sites fail them in the same few ways: images with no alt text, PDFs nobody can read aloud, contrast that fails, and a form that cannot be completed with a keyboard. We test rather than assert, and we write down what still falls short.

How we test accessibility

Every four years, and it always slips

Elected officials, appointed positions, office hours and the assessor all change on a schedule everyone knows about and nobody owns. We put the roster in one place that feeds every page that mentions it, so an election means one edit rather than a hunt.

Start with a plan

All of it, for a township.

The website is where every township starts with us, and it is one of six things we run. Here is the whole shop, in your situation.

Web designA site that answers before the phone ringsThe six questions on the first screen, every office with its hours, the agendas and minutes posted where the law says, readable on a phone and accessible as the law requires. Built so the clerk can post the notice without calling anybody.SearchFound by the name residents useA listing for the hall and for each office, hours and holidays right, and the assessor, the clerk and the road district found by name in the search box without a second address.AdsOnly when there is something to sayAn election notice, a road closure, a meeting that matters, put in front of the residents of your township and nobody else, with a budget the board approved first. Most months, nothing.BrandingThe seal, the letterhead, the sign at the hallOne mark and one set of colors across the site, the notices, the newsletter and the sign, so the township reads as one office and not four.AppsThe permit and the request, off the paperWhen permits, FOIA requests or the dog license still run on a paper form and a walk to the hall, we build the small app that takes them online.ReportingWhat residents looked for, and what they could not findA quarterly page for the board: what residents searched the site for, what they found, what they called about anyway, and what we changed.

The first ninety days, for a township.

In the order the office feels it. The answers first, because the site is only as useful as what it holds.

Weeks one and twoThe answers, gathered

The six questions and the rest of them, written down with the office: the assessor's dates and forms, each exemption, the meeting calendar, the road district, FOIA, and every office's hours. The listings for the hall and the offices set right.

How we run the listings

Weeks three to sixThe site, built

Readable on a phone and accessible as the law requires, the calendar with agendas and minutes, a page per office and per exemption in the words residents use, and a notice the clerk can post in a minute. If the site is sound we fix it; if it is not, we say so and build it.

What we build

Weeks seven to twelveThe office running it, and the first report

The clerk posting the agenda and the notice without us, the listings kept, the forms online, and the first quarterly report to the board: what residents looked for, what they found, and what still rings the phone.

Accessible, as the law requires

Tell us which township.

Three lines and we come back to you, usually within a working day, with what we would look at first. No pitch deck, no quote until there is a plan, and we are glad to present to the board.

Or the free look first: a free SEO audit of your site and your listing, sent over with nothing to sit through. Or call (815) 880-8676.

Questions township offices ask before they call us.

The ones that come up on nearly every first call, answered here so a board meeting does not have to spend twenty minutes on them.

The elected and appointed officials with terms and contact details, office hours, the meeting schedule with notices and agendas posted ahead and minutes after, the budget and appropriation, the FOIA officer and how to file, the assessor with the current appeal deadline and the exemptions, and the road district. Everything after that is useful rather than expected.

Yes, and you should. It stays registered to the township and we never take ownership of it. If the address is changing we handle the redirects so the pages residents have bookmarked and the links from the county still land somewhere.

Whoever you want, and most townships split it. The clerk posts notices, agendas and minutes, because posting an agenda should be typing in a browser rather than a change request, and that is the only way it happens on time. Everything past that we do as ongoing web support: a new page for a new program, the roster after an election, a form that needs rebuilding, the assessment dates when they move. Most of our clients keep that running rather than find somebody each time, and township offices most of all, because the person who would otherwise do it already has four other jobs.

A public body is held to a standard a private business is not, and the exposure is real. Most township sites we look at fail in the same few places, and PDFs are usually the worst of it. We test with the keyboard, the accessibility tree and automated checks, fix what we find, and write down what is still short rather than claiming a clean bill.

Yes, and unlike a trade there is no conflict in it. Two townships are not competing for the same resident, so the work compounds: what we learn about assessment pages in one county is worth something in the next.

What we won't do for a township.

Public money and public records both have rules, and a website vendor is the wrong person to be improvising around them.

We will not write policy or speak for the board

We write the page; the township approves the words. Anything that states a position, a fee, a deadline or a rule goes past the person whose job it is before it is published, and we will wait rather than guess.

We cannot make the county's records into yours

Assessments, tax bills, GIS and recorded documents live with the county. A township site can explain the split and send somebody straight to the right lookup, and that is genuinely most of the value, but we will not pretend the records moved.

A website does not replace the office

The point is fewer calls about the six things that have written answers, so there is room for the ones that need a person. If somebody is selling you a site that removes the need for staff, that is a different pitch and it is not ours.

Nobody buys a plan they haven't seen.

The free audit is a look at what you already have and what it is costing you, sent over with nothing to sit through. The plan is a conversation about where the business is and where you want it to get to, and it ends with a path written down rather than a quote. Or you call, and somebody who works on accounts picks up.

Start with a planTell us about the business and where you want it to go. We build the plan for getting there.Get a free SEO auditYour site and your Google listing, next to the shops you are up against in your own towns. Where you turn up, where they do instead, and what to fix first. We send it over. No call needed.Or just call(815) 880-8676. We're in Rockford, and somebody who actually works on accounts picks up.