In June, the State of Utah launched a refurbished version of its award-winning website at Utah.gov and so far it looks like a huge success. The state began developing ideas for the new portal in 2007, and under the direction of Chief Information Officer Steven Fletcher, finally brought it to life this summer. OhMyGov! took a look at the new site to see how it stacks up against other government websites.

The first thing that you notice when you pull up Utah.gov is that it is visually brilliant. Using Flash graphics the site displays a range of gorgeous photographs of the state along with an array of familiar navigational icons. We agree with Paul Taylor of govtechblogs.com who said the “graphics grab your attention on first visit, coupled with a carousel of icons (with a distinctive Mac-like look and feel) that add a dynamic feel to navigation.”

You won’t find those kind of attention grabbing visuals on most federal agency websites. Despite all of the improvements being made they seem stuck in a bureaucratic format meant to inform but never delight. Utah.gov demonstrates that it is possible to do both.

Among its best features is the easy window into all that the site has to offer. By presenting enticing icons that scream “click me”, as well as a list of recent popular searches, it transforms the idea of visiting a government website from a chore to something fun. As a test of the site’s user friendliness from an outsider’s perspective, I set out to see what kind of travel information was available. A click on the airplane icon (naturally) took me to Utah.travel where a full suite of travel planning resources were artfully presented.

Just because something is attractive and user-friendly doesn’t mean it is smart – just look at … well, we don’t need to name names. Utah.gov is absolutely stuffed full of data that is easily accessible. They have created a data portal on the site that allows you to access information ranging from the number of gall bladders removed to the average wage in Utah.

The website also has some cool features like the award-winning Utah Public Meeting Notice. If you click on this icon you will be sent to a page where you can search for local public meetings, sign up for notification of meetings, or, for true public meeting diehards, a huge list of them from all over the state to choose from. Federal agencies could use this kind of application on their sites to notify citizens of federal events in order to encourage participation.

Utah.gov has also utilized the all important popular social media tools. You can sign up for e-mail or Twitter updates on everything from new data being released to a public meeting notification and that just scratches the surface. They also have an iPhone app, widgets, blogs, and they are Flickring, Facebooking, and YouTubeing. The site won the 2009 Best of the Web award for state portal from the Center for Digital Government.

Reinventing Utah.gov was a success because the state brought leading minds to the table and embraced the Web 2.0 tools that are familiar to its citizens. Developers said they took inspiration from the ideas of Tim O’Reilly, impresario of the Web 2.0 and Gov 2.0 conferences, and partnered with Google on ways to increase access to government data.