Photo Credit: Alizeh Italia
(DUBLIN, Calif.) – For many residents, a municipal website serves as the primary entrance to local government. It is where small business owners apply for permits, renters search for housing assistance, and community members check local ordinances. However, when that site becomes cluttered with duplicate links, obscure jargon, and deeply buried pages, that asset can make residents feel blocked and excluded from their local politics.
In a recent interview with OpGov.News, Dublin mayoral candidate Kiran Mohammad walked through the City of Dublin’s official website to demonstrate why the current platform can be overwhelming for everyday residents. Mohammad also outlined a plan for reform, should all she be elected.
Buried Pages, Redundant Documents, and Inefficient Searching
A central issue site visitors face is the depth of navigation required to perform basic tasks. When a business owner attempts to locate a building permit, the current layout forces them through five layers of the site map: navigating from Government, through Departments, Community, and Building & Safety, before finally reaching Building Permits. As Mohammad pointed out during the demonstration, "You’d click five buttons until you get a building permit."
She emphasized that for a city looking to encourage local economic growth, critical administrative tasks like permitting should be prioritized on the main page rather than buried deep within a website. "If the city was looking towards having us build more businesses in our city, then they should make building permitting the priority to be able to be seen first," Mohammad noted.
Competing top navigation menus—such as "Services," "Business," and "I Want To"—create confusion about where a user should even begin searching, making all five choices look like they are competing. Furthermore, the website suffers from extensive content duplication. Critical documents like annual budgets and financial reports appear repeatedly across different departmental menus. Encounters with multiple replicas of identical files can make simple research feel overwhelming, creating the false impression that users must review dozens of separate reports. "It makes people think they’ve got to read 16 documents now," Mohammad stated.
Moreover, when asked if the usage of the search bar can mitigate this confusion, Mohammed pointed out that if residents hope to simply find their task through the search bar residents must know the exact phrasing and wording of their designated item, since it is a word-for-word search system.
Outdated Language and Technical Jargon
Beyond structural navigation issues, Mohammad pointed out that key portions of the online municipal code remain severely outdated. Parts of the city code have not been updated in four decades, still utilizing offensive historical terminology, including the terms "Oriental" and "Gypsy." Leaving outdated phrasing or expired event notices on the site signals a lack of ongoing maintenance and creates unnecessary barriers. "Confusing websites, old websites, they quietly shut people out," Mohammad observed, adding that it impacts people who already hesitate to reach out.
Photo Credit: Alizeh Italia
The website also categorizes vital public services according to internal municipal department structures rather than everyday human logic. As Mohammad explained, "The city organizes itself based on its own organizational links, but it doesn't see how people think."
Housing services sit strictly under the Planning department, making them difficult to locate for renters searching for assistance. "People who want housing, who are renters, do you think they go to planning? No," Mohammad noted.
Technical acronyms like GIS, vector control, plan room, and SolarAPP+ appear without plain-language explanations. Mohammad questioned the usability of these unlisted acronyms: "What does that even mean to people? They have no idea what that means."
The Real-World Impact on Community and Staff
An inaccessible website carries real-world administrative costs. Getting onto the city website is often the first and only way residents interact with City Hall, especially for busy working families, seniors, or residents who cannot attend evening city council meetings. "This is the first door to City Hall, and for many residents, this may be the only one," Mohammad emphasized.
When residents cannot locate online forms or reporting tools, Mohammed explains they end up inevitably calling the City Clerk's office, increasing staff time spent manually routing inquiries. Mohammad noted that a clear, functional municipal site is essential for building public trust and demonstrating that local government is organized and responsive: "I need a clear website that signals that the city is organized and it's listening and it acts like the city hall is supposed to."
A Task-Based Plan for Reform
To modernize Dublin's digital presence, Mohammad proposes a low-cost reform plan that utilizes existing city staff and the current web platform, stating, "It's going to cost very little and we can start in the first year."
First, Mohammad suggests reorganizing the primary navigation around resident actions: Pay, Apply, Report, Find, and Get Involved. Mohammad highlighted that these categories reflect what residents actually care about.
Additionally, eliminating duplicate links by establishing one canonical page for each official document and routing shortcuts directly to it rather than copying content into multiple menus.
Next, replace technical jargon with plain explanations, remove outdated or offensive language from the municipal code, and clear out expired event announcements so visitors face no confusion.
Then, so all residents are included in their local government’s decisions, Mohammad wants to prioritize clear, translated versions of high-use pages for Dublin’s primary non-English speaking language communities to ensure equitable access.
Lastly, Mohammad said she would like to publish simple public metrics tracking top search queries and average navigation times. As Mohammad summarized, "You can't build a website and think that it works because it's just available. It has to work with progress."
Correction or Addition? If you would like to add information to this report or suggest a correction, please contact me at alizeh.i@lead4earth.org.
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