Refresh: Morgan City government considers new website

Morgan City Mayor Lee Dragna agrees that the city government needs an updated website.
But councilmen weren’t ready during Tuesday’s council meeting to vote on awarding a contract until they can get a closer look at the ideas proposed by a local designer who Dragna recommended.
The council decided, after lengthy discussion, to table awarding the contract to Schola Designs & Consultations in Morgan City. Instead, they will meet in groups of two with the company’s owner, Courtney “Schola” Long, to give presentations on his plans for a revamped website before subsequently gathering and voting next month or at a special meeting called prior.
Long was one of three vendors that Dragna said he contacted about the contract. Because it is a professional service contract, it does not need to be bid publicly, City Attorney Paul Landry said.
Of the vendors, Dragna said, Long and a vendor not named during discussion, who did the city’s current website, responded. Dragna said Long’s bid was for $45,000, while the other bid was for about $44,000. However, the other bidder also said the city owes him about $6,100 in work and that total will be lumped in with the amount for a new website, increasing the amount, the mayor said. City officials said the bidder did not complete the work he is requesting payment for, and Dragna said city department heads don’t want to work with him.
Dragna said he asked repeatedly for documentation of what the city owes the other bidder, and the bidder didn’t furnish any. The bidder also didn’t pursue any action towards recovering it.
At the moment, Dragna said the city has six to seven different websites for city services.
“Everybody’s all over the place,” he said. “Almost all of them are not on the same page.”
The mayor said he wants the website to be linked with tabs for Lake End Park and the Recreation Department, among others.
“The goal here is to be able to do everything online,” Dragna said. “As much as we can do. Even register kids to play baseball.”
He said Schola Designs asked to show city leaders its plan, and the mayor said he and those in attendance were impressed.
“They wanted to prove to us that they were going to be able to help us and promote our city and make our website much better,” Dragna said.
Long spoke before the council and said he wanted to create awareness and a revenue stream for the city through the website.
Councilmen Lou Tamporello and Mark Stephens each said they would like to see multiple companies’ offers before making a decision to spend the money.
Dragna said he understood but also said he called three different companies explaining his ideas. He said if the city would like to publicly bid the item, they would have to hire someone to write a request for quotes because he said he doesn’t know the correct technical terms to craft this type of bid.
“I don’t want to spend more money on it,” Dragna said.
He said he also was concerned about the website’s cost but was assured by Finance Director Deborah Garber that the departments have something in their budget for the cost of a website. The cost is not a lot per department, he said.
After lengthy discussion, Councilman Ron Bias offered a motion to table a website agreement and to meet in groups of two for Long to make a presentation before coming together again, either at a special meeting or next month, to approve it. Tamporello offered a second.
“I don’t have any doubt that you’ve got a good product,” Bias told Long. “I don’t have any doubt that it would be something that would upgrade the antiquated website that the city has. (But) there’s some questions that need to be answered.”
In other action, the council:
—Had the first reading of an ordinance declaring surplus and sale of property adjacent to 1811 Front St.
—Granted a Class A Liquor & Beer permit for Urbano-Duran Pedro, doing business as La Brisas, LLC, at 7418 La. 182 East.
—Approved Dragna appointments to boards: Micah Allen, archives; Tonya Washington, board of adjustments; Ryan Yager, cemetery; Angela Reynaud, convention, tourism and culture; Bobby Dufrene and Don Hicks, economic development; Alex McIntyre, Morgan City Main Street; Don Hicks, Planning and Zoning. Bryce Merrill will be reappointed to the convention, tourism and culture board, while Deborah Price will be reappointed to the Morgan City Main Street Committee.