Pasco sheriff's website gets high-tech facelift

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office has a new look.

It's not a brick-and-mortar facelift; this is of the virtual kind.

This afternoon, sheriff's officials relaunched its website with a shiny new green glow and a new, more user-friendly redesign, according to sheriff's office spokesman Kevin Doll.

It's the first redesign by the agency's Information Technology staff in four years, Doll said.

The new design adds features to inform Pasco residents about important law enforcement and safety issues.

New features include better organized links, a link to the agency's new YouTube site and a Public Alerts page that has more information, including a new "Caught on Camera" section. Click on that section and see scofflaws caught in the act of different crimes at places like Regions Bank in Land O' Lakes, CVS in Holiday and Wal-Mart in Port Richey.

Website users can click on the pictures to find out details about the crime and get a closer look at the suspects. In case anyone recognizes anyone, a case detective and telephone number are found right on the page.

The sheriff's office YouTube Channel, similar to the "Caught on Camera" feature, contains video surveillance from crime scenes in hopes of getting the public's help in solving crimes, Doll said. Additionally, the channel is being used as a public education tool, telling stories about the agency's involvement in the community.

"Kind of like the print articles we have on the website, we feature the services and operations of the sheriff's office on video," Doll said.

Video clips currently on YouTube also highlight the sheriff's office inmate labor program, DUI enforcement with "wolf packs" and school resource officer program.

More new features of the website are already in the works, said Doll.

In March, the site was visited by more than 65,000 times and more than 180,000 times by users in 71 countries. About 27 percent of those visits were by new users, according to Doll. The most visited page was the arrest inquiry page, which allows users to view inmates and their charges from the past several years.