GoDaddy is an on-line Internet domain registrar and web hosting company. The County occasionally has a need to register different internet domain names to either simplify a websites Uniform Resource Locator (URL), reserve a domain name for a future website or to provide a redirect to a current County webpage. For example the Grand Jury uses the domain name “www.shastacountygrandjury.org” to redirect it to the County’s webpage which is actually “www.co.shasta.ca.us/index/gj_index.aspx”.
Departments such as the Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA) does the same in order to simplify different URL’s to make is easier for the public to remember and gain access to services. HHSA has also had a need to setup different websites outside of the existing County external website structure. The HHSA receives state and federal dollars to target specific populations in an effort to reduce smoking, provide information about parenting services, prevent suicide and educate the public on healthy behaviors. The HHSA chose to utilize website hosting services with an outside vendor to allow the web site developers more latitude in the design, look and appearance of the web pages to appeal to the target audience with whom HHSA wants to communicate to in an effort to change risky behaviors, adopt healthier lifestyles and/or prevent adverse events such as suicide, smoking, and illegal drug use. After the Board adopted two new Administrative Policies, 4-301, Social Media Use, (12/11/12) and 4-302 Hypertext Links Use (4/28/15), HHSA began to work with their County Administrative Office analyst, County Counsel, Risk Management, and County Information Technology to come in to compliance with these policies.
Should the Board approve today’s recommendation then all departments would have access to these services either through the Information (IT) Department’s GoDaddy agreement or a similar service provider, pursuant to Administrative Policy 6-101 (Shasta County Contracts Manual).
Additional departments have shown an interest in obtaining GoDaddy services. With IT’s administration of these services IT can review and approve for business need, track total use and expenditures, and consolidate many accounts in to one account. With Board approval IT will add GoDaddy to their approved list of agreements on the County’s IT Intranet webpage so departments have easy access to needed information.
GoDaddy’s Web hosting and Domain Name registration services are a cost effective and easy to manage alternative to setting up the infrastructure required onsite to host different internet domains within the current internet connection setup.