Website Design Services

The Vendor is required to provide to design, develop, and implement a modern, secure, and fully accessible emergency management website that serves as the region’s authoritative source for public safety information.
- Provide to design, develop, and deploy a modern, user-friendly, and resilient emergency management website that serves as a centralized public information hub before, during, and after emergency events.
- This will ensue residents, partners, and stakeholders have timely, accurate and assessable information.
- The platform will support agency mandate to protect public safety and enhance community preparedness by providing timely, accurate, and actionable information in a clear and accessible format.
- Key Objectives:
•    Centralized communication: establish a single, authoritative online destination for emergency alerts, situational updates, and public safety information.
•    Improved public awareness: provide accessible preparedness resources, hazard education materials, and guidance to empower residents and businesses to better prepare for emergencies.
•    Enhanced situational awareness: deliver real-time data through maps, dashboards, and live updates that help the public understand current conditions and make informed decisions.
•    Multi-channel information delivery: streamline the creation and distribution of public information across web, email, SMS, social media, and push notifications from a single platform.
•    Reliability during critical events: ensure continuous service availability and fast performance during high-traffic periods and emergency surges.
•    Ease of use and maintenance: provide an intuitive content management system that allows agency staff to easily update information without extensive technical support.
•    Compliance and accessibility: ensure that the platform meets accessibility standards (WCAG 2.2 AA), supports multilingual content (at minimum English and French) where applicable, and follows best practices in usability, security, and SEO.
•    Social media integration: active presence on platforms like Facebook and x (formerly twitter) for real-time updates during emergencies.
- Key Project Deliverables
•    A full newly designed, developed, and tested and deployed public-facing emergency website.
•    Administrator and content manager training for agency staff.
•    Full technical documentation of hosting environment, CMS architecture, and operational procedures.
•    Integration with Esri or equivalent mapping platform.
•    Comprehensive testing, including:
•    Load and performance testing (must handle large surges during emergency activations)
•    Mobile and browser compatibility
•    Accessibility compliance (WCAG 2.2 aa)
•    Design mock up, beta environment deployments, user acceptance testing (UAT) and training materials.
•    Post-launch support transition and warranty period.
- Disaster Communications
•    Dedicated emergency landing page: a prominently featured page displaying real-time alerts, active incident information, and key updates.
•    News & media releases: dynamic section for official statements, news articles, and media releases, with RSS feed support and email subscription capabilities.
•    Evacuee support portal: dedicated page providing real-time information on shelters, reception centers, and available support services.
•    Interactive mapping: integration with Esri or equivalent mapping tools to visually display evacuation zones, road closures, fire perimeters, reception center locations, and other incident related data.
•    Alert system integration: direct integration with the system to ensure that official alerts are automatically published on the website in real time.
- Preparedness & Public Education
•    Comprehensive pages on emergency preparedness and response guidance.
•    Educational campaigns, digital and printable checklists, and recommended emergency kits.
•    Hazard-specific information (e.g., wildfire, flood, extreme weather, hazardous materials).
•    A “myth-busting” section to counter misinformation.
•    Links and references to partner agencies and resources.
- The solution should include:
•    Robust hosting infrastructure: high availability hosting capable of handling significant surge traffic during emergency events.
•    Multi-channel distribution system: a single interface for drafting and distributing content (media releases, newsletters, public statements etc.) Multiple channels, including:
o    Website updates
o    Email notifications
o    SMS alerts (integration-ready)
o    Social media feeds
o    Push notifications
•    Mobile-responsive and accessible design: fully responsive design optimized for mobile and tablet devices and compliant with WCAG 2.2 level AA standards.
•    Content management system (CMS): intuitive, secure CMS enabling agency staff to update site content independently without continuous technical support.
•    Reliability and support: 24/7 technical support during emergency activations, with defined service level agreements (SLAS) for maintenance and uptime.
•    Performance optimization: SEO best practices, fast load times, and efficient caching to ensure high performance under load.
•    Analytics and insights: integrated analytics dashboard to track user engagement, traffic sources, and user behavior.
•    Failover & redundancy: built-in failover system ensuring a static backup site remains available if the primary CMS becomes unavailable. Load and stress testing must confirm the site’s ability to handle significant traffic surges, particularly during initial emergency notification periods and the first surge of visitors.
•    Security considerations: implement SSL certificates, regular backups, and secure access protocols.
•    Search functionality: robust site-wide search with keyword auto suggestions and filtering.
•    Scalability: the platform must sustain a minimum of 50,000 concurrent users during critical events.
•    Web Mapping: Ability to embed and link to ESRI ArcGIS online application (currently under development) using iframes or similar technology. Ability to link out to the web map through a button, image, card, or other tool would also be desirable for mobile device compatibility.
- Administrator and User Training
•    Training delivery: the supplier will provide comprehensive training sessions for agency administrators and content contributors, covering all aspects of site management, including content creation, publishing workflows, user roles, system settings, and analytics tools. 
•    Training materials: detailed training materials, including user manuals, step-by-step guides, and video tutorials (if applicable), must be delivered prior to go-live.
•    Ongoing support: the supplier will provide follow-up Q&A sessions and technical support during the first 90 days following launch to address any additional training needs or post-launch adjustments.
•    After the initial 90 days basic service levels shall be as and when required approach with the exception of an activated disaster events which would require 24/7 support availability.

- Contract Period/Term: 3 years
- Questions/Inquires Deadline: November 10, 2025