Local meeting house website?

[benosborne]

Hi,

I have been asked to help our Stake Public Affairs Specialist with raising local awareness of public events. He has tasked me at looking into the possibility of running a local meeting house website that can be administered by the ward, for instance http://www.the churchofjesuschristhereford.co.uk/ as an example.

Now I appreciate that there maybe strict guidelines against this however not being able to find any information as such lead to this question.

The type of content will be in the form of the local units charity and community work past and present, upcoming public events, some basic beliefs without steering away from Mormon.org, local history our stake has a deep history of the church such as the pioneers and Gadfield Elm which the local population would like to know easily, and local social media interaction.

any help, information or even warnings would be much appreciated.

Ben

[jdlessley]

Now I appreciate that there maybe strict guidelines against this however not being able to find any information as such lead to this question.

The guidance is in Handbook 2, 21.1.22.

Note that "take and ward Web sites may be created only by using the official Church Internet resources. Stakes and wards are not authorized to create other Web sites or blogs or otherwise have a Church-sponsored presence on the Internet." There is an exception noted in the seventh paragraph under the sub-section titled "Official Church Internet Resources". I doubt that what your stake wants to do would qualify. Nevertheless, I would follow the guidance in that section and have the stake president submit a request to the Area Presidency if that is what he really wants to do.

There is another way to get out the information for the stake on a website. In 21.1.22 in the sub-section titled "Members’ Use of the Internet in Church Callings" it states, "ndividual members may create Web sites or blogs or make use of other appropriate Internet resources in their Church callings..." There is a proviso requiring a disclaimer in addition to the guidelines listed in section 21.1.22 for member use of the Internet resources in their Church callings.

[benosborne]

thank you very much.

[russellhltn]

I have been asked to help our Stake Public Affairs Specialist with raising local awareness of public events.

I'm not sure as a website will accomplish what they want. "Build it and they will come" doesn't apply to websites. They'd somehow have to drive traffic to it. I think you'd have better luck getting notices into existing websites, such as the local newspaper's "calendar" or "events" section.