Elizabethtown, NY, is launching a new brand and website to position itself as the “Hometown of the Adirondacks”. The website will focus on serving residents and visitors.

The website (at the same https://elizabethtown-ny.gov/ address) will feature a new look and is expected to launch Feb. 18 or soon after. The new site combines municipal information, event listings, business information, and tips for how to take advantage of the history, culture, arts scene and outdoor recreation opportunities in this community.

The new site will provide comprehensive information for residents, potential residents, and visitors. The process is the result of a partnership between the Town of Elizabethtown, the Elizabethtown Social Center, the Northern Forest Center, the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism, and engaged community volunteers.

“This new website is intended to achieve multiple goals, but one of our top priorities is to make town government more accessible to our residents and to highlight the many initiatives that we are working on to improve our community,” said Cathleen Reusser, Supervisor of the Town of Elizabethtown. “From helping our community access FEMA funding to tackling our water and wastewater infrastructure, the Town Board and I are moving this community forward, and we want to invite our residents to be informed and engaged in this work.”

Past strategic planning work revealed that residents were clamoring for a more integrated way to find out what is happening in Elizabethtown.

“We wanted to highlight all that is happening in this community in one accessible location,” said Laurie House, the Executive Director of the Elizabethtown Social Center. “There is so much to do here – from events to recreation to businesses – but much of it has been hidden from view. This new site will help change that.”

The initiative started with generating a new brand identity, an effort that was volunteer-led and grew over time. The Northern Forest Center, a nonprofit community partner, supported and helped facilitate this process, including formalizing the brand and transitioning into the website. The brand identity plays on the beloved local shorthand of the town’s name as E’town, the role of the apostrophe, and the visual link between “Hometown” and “Home’town.”

“Elizabethtown is a really exciting community, and we’re pleased to be part of an initiative that makes that vibrancy so visible,” said Leslie Karasin, the Adirondack Program Director with the Northern Forest Center. “In particular, we want potential residents to get excited about Elizabethtown – to consider making it their hometown. Attracting and retaining residents – especially younger people – is important for the vitality and well-being of our towns.”

To create the website, the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism (ROOST) provided web development services as part of its commitment to supporting the communities of Essex County.  The website is built on ROOST’s cutting edge and proprietary ADKData backend which ensures the most current information is available to visitors on the site  ADKData also optimizes the website for both traditional search and artificial intelligence platforms.

“Our communities have a tremendous amount to offer both residents and visitors, and we’re pleased to leverage our web development and communications expertise to support Elizabethtown in reaching its goals,” said Dan Kelleher, President and CEO of ROOST. “This collaboration highlights the strong partnerships that differentiate Adirondack communities from all others across New York State.”

The committee driving the website forward has plans to deepen and expand the content on the site and are already partnering with community volunteers to help build out the site’s content.