The city plans to roll out a new website and digital storage system for official documents at the beginning of 2011.

It’ll bring a new level of transparency to the city’s government and allow people to closely examine contemporary city documents, such as meeting minutes, ordinances and resolutions — as well as historical documents dating back to the city’s formation without the risk of damaging fragile paper and bindings, said Terri Daulton, city clerk.

Read more: Anniston Star – Heflin archives to go online in 2011

The website will be part of the town’s contract with the TriNovus company, which will also install the VendorVault online public records database system to work with the website.

Starr Largin of TriNovus said VendorVault provides municipalities with three features in one product: a disaster recovery system for records, organization and transparent government.

“It’s Internet-based, so the mayor and city council can be out of the office and actually be able to access all the city hall records 24 hours a day, seven days a week from their home or anywhere they have Internet access,” Largin said. “It’ll allow the citizens to be able to access the records 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”

Vincent council member Bridgette Jordan-Smith, who first contacted Largin about the VendorVault system and city website, said the website will allow local citizens as well as out-of-towners to find out more about Vincent.

“We’re the only town now in south Shelby that doesn’t have a website, so I’m excited for the opportunity for us to finally have one,” Jordan-Smith said. “We have a rich history, and we’ll be able to share that information with our citizens.”

Jordan-Smith said she hopes the website will help Vincent citizens interact with the town government.

“Vincent is a hot topic now, and people are trying to find out more information about Vincent, so we need to have a website where people can find out about our town,” she said. “We are creating a more transparent government. I think it will open up so many doors for us.”

The VendorVault system will also be an asset for Vincent, she said. Right now, all the town’s public records, deeds and ordinances are saved at the Vincent Town Hall, both electronically and on paper.

“If our city hall were to burn down today, we would lose everything,” Jordan-Smith said.

Largin said she will meet with Vincent officials soon to design the website. She said she expects the site, which does not yet have a web address, to go live within two weeks.

Recent events in Vincent point to the need for a town website and easy access to public records, Largin said.

“Due to the quarry event and people complaining that they did not know what was going on at city hall because they could not get in and the town didn’t have a website, the city of Vincent is planning for future growth by providing this information to their citizens 24 hours a day and seven days a week,” she said.

Largin said TriNovus also makes website design available to local businesses.

Four other municipalities in Shelby County currently use the VendorVault system, including Pelham, Columbiana, Montevallo and Wilton.

For more information about TriNovus website design or the VendorVault system, contact Starr Largin at starr.largin@trinovus.com.

Original Article from Shelby County Reporter.

Wilton, with the help of the Birmingham-based TriNovus company, recently established the town’s first website at Wiltonalabama.com.

The new website contains links to the town’s online bill payment system, a calendar of town events and a list of Wilton’s government officials.

“It’s like an all-access pass to city hall 24/7,” said Wilton Town Clerk April Price. “We are very excited about it.”

The new site also contains a guestbook and an online action center, which will allow Wilton’s residents to voice concerns to town hall around the clock, Price said.

Through the action center, residents can list their name, address, the nature of their concern and their contact information. The action center data is then transferred to town hall, where it can be directed to the proper town official.

“The action center is a direct link to us,” Price said. “Like if someone has a burst water main, or if there is a street light out or a dog running loose or something, they can submit their concern online and it will go straight to my desk.”

The website’s “history” tab contains a town guest book, and Price urged anyone who lives or who has ever lived in Wilton to sign the book and share their memories of the town.

“We would like anyone with a memory of Wilton to leave us a message about something they remember,” Price said. “Our goal is to publish a community cookbook with some of those memories printed in it.”

The town also has some future plans for the site, including a full town business directory and list of important numbers for those moving into the town.

Wilton officials are also working with TriNovus to integrate the site into the company’s VendorVault system, which will serve as an online database for the town’s documents once it is installed.

“We still have a few tweaks to make to the site,” Price said. “But I personally am very excited about it. Wilton has never had anything like this before.”

Original Article from Shelby County Reporter.

On June 15, the Montevallo City Council passed a motion to securely preserve those records forever.

The council agreed to become the fourth Shelby County municipality to install the VendorVault Document Management System, which was developed by the Birmingham-based TriNovus financial software company.

Pelham, Wilton and Columbiana previously adopted the VendorVault system.

Through the VendorVault program, Montevallo will be able to archive all of its city council minutes, agendas, ordinances, resolutions, deeds, leases, vehicle titles and contracts on an Internet database.

Although the city began keeping its records in an electronic format many years ago, the city still has a vault filled with paper records stretching back to 1887.

“There had been some major concerns about what would happen to all the records in our vault in the event of a disaster,” said Montevallo City Clerk Herman Lehman. “We wanted to find a way to back up all the paper records in our vault.”

Montevallo has already backed up the records currently stored in an electronic format, but will gradually move some of its electronic records to the VendorVault system to allow the public to more easily access them, Lehman said.

The city will likely put all of its past City Council minutes and current contracts on the VendorVault system first before moving on to other records.

“The minutes are very important. It’s important that we be able to look back and see when the city passed something,” Lehman said. “Getting those in the VendorVault system is going to be critical.”

Lehman said the VendorVault system seemed to be a “good fit” for the city, and said the program would likely make Montevallo City Hall more efficient.

“We are an old city. We have got some fairly old records in our vault,” Lehman said. “I think this system is going to be very helpful to all of us.

“I think we will get into it and see there are more benefits to the system than we even realize,” Lehman added.

Original Article from Shelby County Reporter.

In addition to losing its mayor’s office, council chambers and one its earliest landmarks, Wilton also lost nearly all of its public records, deeds and ordinances when its town hall burned to the ground in the early 1900s.

Today, the new town hall, which was built in 1934, houses thousands of paper copies of its records dating back to the year the new town hall was constructed.

But because fire has already once destroyed the town’s archives, Wilton officials are now taking a 21st-century approach toward ensuring the disaster never repeats itself.

This summer, Wilton will become the third Shelby County municipality to install the VendorVault Document Management System, which was developed by the Birmingham-based TriNovus financial software company.

Through the VendorVault program, Wilton will be able to archive all of its town council minutes, agendas, ordinances, resolutions, deeds, leases, vehicle titles and contracts on an Internet database.

“Our first town hall burned, and when it did, we lost everything,” said Wilton Town Clerk April Price. “This will just allow us to have the added security of having all that information stored on one online database.”

The town will implement the document management program when it launches its new city website in mid June. The website will also integrate the town’s online water bill payment system, which the city recently began offering.

As of May 13, town officials had not yet finalized the town’s website address.

“Sometimes, when you have a part-time mayor or city council members, it can be difficult to get in touch with the city,” said Starr Largin, a TriNovus marketing representative. “This program will give everyone access to town hall 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”

Allowing online access to the town’s documents will help Wilton save money on copies, and will allow town residents to take care of many items without having to travel to the town hall, Price said.

The system will also keep track of contracts the city has entered, and will ensure city officials do not miss a contract renewal date or stay in a contract too long, said Largin.

“This program will notify the city by e-mail when it is time to renew their contracts,” Largin said. “Sometimes, cities are just automatically paying on contracts for things they don’t even use anymore. This will help them manage all of those contracts.

“It will also give the city the high, medium and low costs of what their peer cities are paying the companies they are contracted with,” she added. “It can be used as a bargaining tool.”

Original Article from Shelby County Reporter.

The city has begun testing a new program by TriNovus, a financial software company, called the VendorVault Document Management System.

VendorVault will open up City Hall to the citizens, allowing residents to access council agendas, council minutes, council work session minutes, ordinances, resolutions, deeds, leases, vehicle titles, contracts and more via the Internet.

All documents will be included on the site, including ones dating back all the way to the city’s beginnings in 1964.

The city began loading documents to the site Feb. 17, and has since loaded 1,049 documents dating back to 1979.

The system should be available to the public in two- to three weeks, and should be completely updated by September.

In addition to serving as a back-up for many of the city’s documents that were hand-written previous to the mid-1980s, it will also serve as a back-up to the city’s current electronic documents.

“The city of Pelham was incorporated on July 10, 1964, and since that time all city records have been maintained in a paper format, which has been a great concern of mine,” said City Clerk Tom Seale. “Almost everything we have is paper. Nothing is digital. If City Hall burns down, we have nothing.”

In addition to Pelham, the city of Columbiana has also approved use of the system.

Starr Largin, a marketing representative for TriNovus, said the system would also be a huge benefit to cities with part-time mayors, such as Columbiana.

“It gives them the capability to pull up documents at anytime, whether they are in the office or on the road,” Largin said. “This gives not only the public access, but it also is beneficial to city accountants and lawyers. It’s access 24/7.”

Seale, who also serves as a Columbiana City Council member, said the system will be extremely beneficial to both cities’ citizens and employees.

“The ability for the mayor, city council, employees, the public and media to have complete and immediate access to all public records is a tremendous asset in our efforts to be completely transparent in city government,” Seale said.

Since Pelham is one of the first municipalities to use the system, the city is also serving as a testing ground to let TriNovus know what works, what doesn’t work and how things can be improved.

One way Seale said the system will immediately help the city is by reducing clerical costs and time.

By saving time, money and opening up City Hall, Pelham Mayor Don Murphy said it is a win-win for the city.

“This will allow us to be more transparent to the public and help them in the cyber age we’re in,” Murphy said. “It’s another way of saving for the city and it will expedite things for the people.”

Original Article by Shelby County Reporter.