City Times Staff

The City of Stevens Point has been awarded for excellence in government transparency via its website design.

The Wisconsin Women’s Council (WWC), in partnership with the Wisconsin Newspaper Association and the Wisconsin Broadcaster’s Association, has awarded the city with the “ConnectWI Gold” recognition for its website transparency practices.

The award comes on the heels of Sunshine Week 2016 (March 13-19), a national initiative to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government.

“We commend the City of Stevens Point for placing a high priority on being well connected to their community and providing easy access to information regarding public officials, programs and services,” the WWC said in a news release.

“This award is a fantastic validation of what our goals have been for some time now,” said Mayor Mike Wiza. “We are honored to receive the gold-level designation and will continue to explore every option to keep the public involved.”

ConnectWI was established in 2015 to shine a spotlight on website transparency in local government and promote best practices. ConnectWI recognizes county, city, village, town and school district websites that fulfill a 10-point checklist aimed at promoting transparency. Websites that excel beyond the basic criteria are awarded a gold designation.

Municipalities recognized to-date include the cities of Appleton, Eau Claire, Lodi, Reedsburg, River Falls and Waupaca and the villages of Deforest, Kronenwetter and Weston.

The city’s website is managed by John Quirk, who also runs the city’s television and radio stations.