Cost of site promoting Edmonton being questioned

EDMONTON - A website promoting our city abroad through stories is coming under fire for the amount it's costing taxpayers.

City Councillor Kerry Diotte was not on council when the city created Edmontonstories.ca in 2009, which now holds more than 300 unique stories. Diotte wonders about the cost, though.

"We've spent millions with the website and with things associated with it and I just have the view that we have to get more value for the dollar," he said.

By the end of 2012, Edmontonstories.ca will have cost city taxpayers just over $3.3 million dollars. When you do the math, taking into account this year's $600,000 budget for the page, the fact that the site draws about 600 visits a day, which amounts to just under 220-thousand visits over the year - each visit ends up costing the city $2.74.

They're numbers that the people we spoke to were taken aback by.

"Are you serious? That's crazy. That's a lot of money to spend on just stories of people," said one person on Whyte Avenue.

"That's a lot of money for something I've never even heard of," added another.

"We've got to do a better job and get more value for the money Because the whole thing with social media is it should not be expensive," Diotte admitted. ""I think we can get the word out there in a much better fashion."

The online effort has its share of supporters among council as well, including Mayor Stephen Mandel.

"It has been an effective avenue to market the city," he said. "I think having people talk about the greatness of our city is vitally important to those who are coming here to see those who have been here and how much they enjoy it... And if you get people to come here for two dollars, it's not a bad deal."

In March of 2010, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation nominated the website for a Teddy award, which go to the worst examples of government waste, after it cost 1.4 million dollars to launch. City administration is currently evaluating the site to try to determine if it's good value for money spent.


With files from Ross Neitz, Global News