Opening up city hall

Barrie’s new website will even talk to you
By Kate Harries AWARE Simcoe January 30 2010
Things are looking up at Barrie City Hall – for citizens who want to be in the know.
There’s a new website that’s loaded with information and fun to explore. It will even talk to you, with an up-to-the-minute ‘browse aloud’ feature.

It has instant links to maps of parks, bike paths, and city transit routes.  Webcam afficionados can check out what’s going on around city hall.
Property taxes? Full details on how to pay and a link to the budget so you can see what you’re paying for.
There’s a section on culture, and a section on business. There’s a calendar: click on a date and find out what’s going on. You can look up each department and get the department head’s name and contact information.
The site is clearly laid out and easy to navigate – clearly a lot of creativity and hard work went into this.
The mayor has a blog. A recent posting advises that city council now has an Open Session. “In the bad old days (ie. before last week), there was no way for residents to simply address their City Council,” Jeff Lehman writes. “The only way you could get on Council’s agenda was to be opposed to something that has been discussed the previous week – confusing and very limiting.
“With Open Delegations there is the opportunity to any member of the public to speak to Council, on any topic related to the City of Barrie.  It’s a relatively small change but I think a very important one – part of opening up City Hall to more public input.”
Good work, Barrie!