CAMDEN — The first generation of  the Camden municipal website has come to the end of its useful life, and the Select Board unanimously agreed Dec. 4 to overhaul it, contracting with a Troy, Michigan-based company to make it shine.

The town had received 11 proposals after putting the website redesign out to bid. Four were selected for further consideration, three (based in Portland, Maine; Kansas and Michigan) were interviewed, and after much deliberation, the committee’s recommendation to the Select Board was Revize.com.

“We were incredibly impressed with two of the companies,” said Camden Town Manager Audra Caler-Bell, at the regularly scheduled board meeting.

(Review the Dec. 4 board packet for the entire proposals)

The deciding factors, according to Caler-Bell, included the proposed ease of use and ability to customize the site for Camden’s own purposes, as proposed by Revize.com, which describes itself at its website as government website experts.

The upgrade of Camden’s website reflects evolving expectations of a municipal website should be. The current Select Board has cited the website as a necessary public resource, and wants it to become more than a platform on which meeting agendas and staff contact email addresses are listed.

According to the small committee of Camden staff and citizens who review the various packages, Revize will work with Camden to build a Camden-specific design.

“They are keen and eager to customize,” said Select Board member Alison McKellar. “And the price is great.”

Caler-Bell said following the meeting that the cost will be $18,000, with unlimited customer service and tech support. The board also discussed centralizing on the new website other town functions, including the Camden Snow Bowl.

“We'll pay for this out of the marketing/community development line from the planning/codes/development department budget,” she said. “We had $9,000 we carried forward from last year and $9,000 for this year.  The ongoing cost for technical support and hosting is $1,800 per year. This comes out of the Licensing/Streaming/Domain line in the IT budget.”

The other two companies that submitted proposals to work with Camden included Civicplus, based in Kansas, and Visible Logic, of Portland.

Revize has a number of municipal clients in Maine, including Augusta and Saco. Revize also created websites for Logan, Utah, and St. Petersburg, Florida, among others.

“They enjoy the challenge of solving municipal problems,” said Select Board member Alison McKellar.