HABC
About the Housing Authority of Baltimore City
Baltimore Housing supports over 19,500 households in our city, providing support and funding to ensure that families have a safe place to live and that the city continues to have affordable housing, and vibrant spaces with strong community partnerships across all sectors.
The Housing Authority of Baltimore City (HABC) shapes communities and supports our city in innumerable ways. Ignition72 was given the opportunity to play a part by redesigning and re-imagining how the HABC website would work, bridging the digital divide and keeping the community informed. We created an audience-specific site to satisfy the specific requirements and the overarching goals of this transformative entity.
Learning + Planning
At the time, the HABC website was confusing in how it spoke to multiple audiences including tenants, landlords, and over 600 employees. Embracing the goals, principles and research of the HABC team, Ignition72 devised a strategy to focus the site around customer service and communication with the community. The result is an easy to manage, clear, vibrant and positive web experience for all audiences.
Design + Development
Our design team worked to showcase HABC’s efforts, impact and initiative in fighting to improve the lives of Baltimore residents. New design elements were created to this end including new imagery, alert systems, as well as critical updates relating to COVID and other circumstances. Critical to this execution was being mindful of HABC’s branding goals and striking the appropriate tone to tell their story.
The development group worked alongside design to ensure proper integration of important user experience elements and required functionality. Focusing on customer service the site includes Google Translate capabilities, a responsive navigation and clear information architecture, while being mindful of accessibility needs. Using the Umbraco CMS we were able to keep the project in open source and DotNet, ensuring the internal resources are able to maintain and carry the site forward into the future.
Results
As the COVID pandemic escalated the need for housing services, the HABC site served 100,000 visitors roughly every three months. This is an increase of 204% in users and 83% when measuring page views. As a local partner, I72 was grateful to have completed the redesign to accommodate the need and meet HABC’s objectives in serving the Baltimore community, housing rights, and the welfare of its citizens.