Editorial
Web winners

In the 21st Century googling is a verb; blogging, IMing and e-mailing are highly common forms of communicating, and every good business has a Web site.

Towns should not be held to a different standard. In fact they should be leading the charge.

Ashburnham spends just $700 a year to have former resident Ken Dolder maintain and update the town's official Web site.

And the money isn't even from the revenue brought in by taxation. It is money that is returned to the town from ComCast Cable Company as part of the contract allowing them to operate in town.

This is a lot of bang for their buck.

But the town has a simple, functional and highly informative Web site. And this month that site was recognized by Common Cause - a statewide non-profit organization - as one of only 20 percent of municipal Web sites statewide deserving of "stars."

According to Common Cause, the municipalities that post all of the targeted records range in size from Pelham, with 1,422 people, to Boston, with a population of 569,165.

In Ashby, Town Clerk Lorraine Pease should receive a lot of praise.

She makes great use of the town's Web site to disperse information immediately. She posts election results - which are still counted by hand - on the Web within hours of the polls closing. She places the town meeting warrant on the town's site as well as other notices.

But it is hard to find any other information on the Ashby site. The links are there but within the links the information is lacking.

Westminster's Web site is the worst amongst the local towns. In a town that is growing and updating, now is the time for town officials to focus on Westminster's Internet presence, especially now that town hall employees and businesses just relocated into the new building and all departments now have e-mail address and Internet connections.

Town officials in Townsend and Westminster acknowledge they have the capacity to improve their sites and plan on working toward that goal. They have 12 months before Common Cause reviews the Web sites again. By then, let's hope we have four star towns in our area.