Welcome to the new, redesigned website of the Wisconsin Office of Justice Assistance. We have spent nearly a year creating a site that we hope you will find appealing and easy to use, as well as one that represents OJA and all its activities.
When we set out to redesign our website, we had several main goals in mind:
- Better representing what the agency does and how it coordinates with justice efforts across the state
- Giving users what they need in a clean, simple, organized and easy-to-use format
- Updating the site to use state-of-the-art open-source web technologies, making maintenance and future expansion of the site much easier
I believe we have accomplished those goals. We will still add and change content continuously from now on – the web is never “finished” – and I hope to get a lot of feedback from you, the site users. But we have created a flexible framework that should serve us well in the years to come.
We’ve divided the site into three main sections: Grants, with information about the grant opportunities available through OJA; Programs, which details the program areas OJA focuses its efforts around; and Policy, outlining the role OJA plays in developing justice policy in Wisconsin. On the front page, we’ve added a slide show that explains the operations of the agency as a whole.
Throughout the process of developing the new site, we’ve worked hard to simplify common tasks and make navigating around the site easy and fast. Many government sites present users with large menus of links and choices, so unless you know exactly how to get where you are going, it’s difficult to find your way. We’ve done our best to work against that, always giving you clear choices of where you can go next.
I’m proud of what we’ve developed, but this is just the beginning. With your feedback, we can continue to make the site better. And I have many plans for the future, including much more work on online help and training materials.
So please, take a minute and let us know what you think of the new site, good and bad. Only with your help can we make this website the best it can be.
Adam J. Blust
Editor-in-Chief, OJA.wi.gov