Public Information Committee recommends CivicPlus website platform to full council

The Maumee Public Information Committee voted to recommend that the full Maumee City Council approve switching the city’s website to CivicPlus after a vendor presentation and committee discussion.

Nancy, a committee presenter, opened the discussion by saying the goal was to “reorganize and simplify information” and to “improve the user experience and resident engagement with things like language translation and ADA features.” CivicPlus representatives told the committee the platform includes an agenda‑management system that provides easier public access to agendas, packets and video and offers digitized forms for registrations, permits and service requests.

The vendor said the city can import past agendas, minutes, documents and videos (documents as PDFs and videos in MP4 format) and outlined a phased implementation. An account executive said content transfer is typically the most time‑consuming step and that the overall process can take as little as three to four months and as long as six to seven months depending on the city’s schedule. The vendor also told the committee that billing would not begin until Jan. 1, 2026 even if the city signed an agreement earlier.

Committee members asked about alerting and resident‑request tools. A vendor representative described a built‑in “notify me” module for email and text alerts and said social‑media posting is possible but requires a small, additional integration. The vendor said a GIS‑enabled, map‑based request system called C Click Fix is an add‑on that can be embedded via an iFrame or an app. The vendor also said certain add‑ons, including C Click Fix, could be offered at no charge for the first year if added now, with fees beginning in year two.

On costs, the vendor referenced a first‑year figure described in the meeting as roughly “29” with a recurring amount around “20” (figures as stated in the presentation). The vendor confirmed billing would commence Jan. 1, 2026 and that the first invoice would appear then.

Unidentified Speaker 4 moved to recommend the CivicPlus changeover to full council, and Unidentified Speaker 2 seconded the motion. After a voice vote in which members said “aye,” the committee chair declared the motion passed and agreed to forward the recommendation to council.

The committee also discussed training and operations: the vendor proposed half‑day training sessions for up to 12 staff each and said the platform’s back‑end tools would make it easier for departments to manage and archive content. The vendor emphasized that departments will need to review and purge outdated pages before migration and offered an archive center to retain legacy pages without making them public.

The committee’s recommendation now moves to the Maumee City Council for consideration.