A meeting of the Mountain Lakes Web Site Committee was held on Apr 9, 2008 at the Mountain Lakes Borough Hall.  In attendance were Chairman Andy Bulfer, Clive Knowles, Nilesh Shringarpure, Mark Watrous, Borough Council Liaison Blair Schleicher-Wilson and Borough Manager Joe Tempesta.

Andy Bulfer started the meeting by explaining that Borough Manager Joe Tempesta had been invited to discuss potential projects that could make the Borough Web site more useful and valuable to residents and to the Borough administration.  It was decided to suspend regular business agenda to devote the entire time to this discussion.

The following potential projects were discussed:

Forms Center

Several areas of the Forms Center were discussed.

• Police Forms -- Having police forms on line was proposed by Chief Tovo at a recent Borough Council meeting.  The Borough has outsourced police dispatch function to Morris County and as a result, the police office is unstaffed during nighttime hours.  Hence, a method must be found to accommodate routine matters for the public during those hours.  The following will be added to the Forms Center:
  • handicap parking;
  • gun permits;
  • request for police reports;
  • teen safety check;
  • internal affairs complaint.
• Construction Department -- The forms center currently has links to a state Web site that has construction permit forms.  However the links, while not wrong, send users to a confusing place in the state site.  Joe Tempesta will suggest better link urls.  The major forms needed in the construction area are:
  • Fire sub code;
  • Electrical sub code;
  • Plumbing sub code.
• Recreation -- This section is considered ok.
• Shade Tree -- The Web Committee recently updated the Shade Tree Removal form so that now this section is ok.
• Tax Forms -- These are not as clear as they should be.  Tempesta will discuss with the Borough CFO.
• Planning Board -- This section is considered ok.

Public Works

Joe Tempesta said that a majority of the telephone calls he receives from citizens are requests for DPW service.  He currently keeps a log of such requests manually so that he can track and follow up on them.  In the longer term, he would like to have an automated trouble reporting system that both he and citizens could use that would automatically forward trouble reports to DPW and maintain a log for the Borough Manager's use.

Municipal Court

Joe Tempesta said he was concerned about the hours advertised for the Municipal Court clerk's office.  However, before it can be changed on the Web site, Tempesta said he needs to finalize exactly what they should be.  He said that fortunately a lot of people pay traffic and parking tickets on-line making the too-few open hours less of a concern.

Broadcast E-mail

The proposal for a broadcast e-mail system was discussed.  It was originally suggested by Mayor George Jackson and the Web Committee put significant effort into studying it.  A report was made to the Borough Council on June 11, 2007.  The Borough Council appeared to feel the system was valuable but did not indicate either support or non-support for any of the possible applications.  Instead, it asked the Borough Manager to study how the system could be used and what procedures and policies were required.  However the Borough Manager was not able to get to the project before he resigned and no progress has been made.

Tempesta said he would look into proceeding with it.  He also stated he would like to talk to the proposed vendor.  Nilesh Shringarpure will work with him on it.

Ordering Boat Slips/Racks on the Web

This is similar to ordering beach/tennis tags but is further complicated because the number of available slips/racks is fewer than the demand.  Any ordering system would have to allocate slips/racks in a fair and balanced way.  Since the slips/racks have already been allocated for 2008 was decided to table this project until next year.

Borough Budget and Annual Financial Information on the Web

The Web Committee felt it is important to have budget and financial information available to citizens.  After some discussion, the following was decided:

• Budget Information -- The summary of the introductory budget will be forwarded to the Web Committee for placement on the Web site.  This is the version that was advertised in the newspapers.  Later, when the budget is finalized, the final version will replace the introductory version.
• Annual Financial Information -- The Web Committee requested information similar to what is in a corporate annual report: income statements, balance sheets, text discussion and explanation.  It was decided that the summary of the annual audit report would be appropriate.  Joe Tempesta will arrange that it be forwarded in machine-readable form to the Web Committee.

Legal Notices on the Web

Putting legal notices on the Borough Web site is currently permitted by the State but newspaper ads are still required.  A bill to permit it to replace newspaper ads has been proposed in the legislature but its likelihood of passage is not known.  Nevertheless, there may be no harm in getting started.

It was decided to go ahead.  The Web Committee will set up a separate section for legal notices.  There will be three sub-sections: Borough, Planning Board, Zoning Board of Adjustment.  The Borough Clerk will be able to upload the notices using a system similar to that which is used for Borough Council minutes.

Joe Tempesta will look into whether money can be saved by putting abbreviated notices in the newspaper with references to the full notices residing on the Web site.

Registration for Recreation Programs on the Web

It was decided to table this project until next year.

Date for Next Meeting

The next regular meeting will be on Wed, May 14, 2008 at Borough Hall.

Andy Bulfer,
Chairman