USER GUIDE

Meetings & Events

Post public meetings, community events, and their agendas and minutes to a calendar on your website — and, when you want, let people register to attend.

Before you begin

Every event has to live on a calendar, so on a brand-new site your very first step is to create at least one calendar to hold your events. If you try to save an event without picking a calendar, the system will remind you to choose one.

If your organization uses SimpleAgendas™ to run its board and council meetings, note that meetings you create there can also appear here — see the SimpleAgendas guide for that workflow. This guide covers the built-in Meetings & Events calendar.

Everything lives under Left menu › Meetings & Events. That landing page links to Add Event/Meeting, Manage Events, Manage Calendars, Event Registration, and Event Registration Settings.

1 Create a calendar (do this first)

Go to Left menu › Meetings & Events › Manage Calendars and click Add (or open an existing calendar to edit it). Give the calendar a Title, such as "City Council Meetings" or "Community Events".

A few helpful options on the calendar:

Title Abbreviation — a short label used where space is tight.
Meeting — turn this on if the calendar holds official meetings (agendas, minutes) rather than general events.
Use on homepage — lets this calendar's items feed a calendar area on your home page.
Assigned department — ties the calendar to the right department.

Click Save Calendar. You can add as many calendars as you need.

Tip: The Import Events tab on a saved calendar lets you upload a spreadsheet (CSV) of events all at once instead of adding them one by one.

2 Add a meeting or event

Go to Left menu › Meetings & Events › Add Event/Meeting. Fill in the basics on the General tab:

Title — the name of the event.
Start and End date and time. Turn on All Day for events with no set clock time.
Show in these calendars — check at least one calendar. This is required.
Description — the details visitors read. This uses the Page Editor, so you can add formatted text, links, and images.
Optional: Location, Cost Description, Contact Email, and Contact Phone Number.

Click Save Event. Use View Event afterward to see how it looks on the live site.

Note: The Make Recurring tab lets you copy the same event onto several future dates at once, and the Web Meeting Info tab holds an online meeting link, ID, and passcode for virtual meetings.

3 Manage Meetings/Events

Go to Left menu › Meetings & Events › Manage Events to see a searchable list of everything you have posted, newest first. You can filter by title, by calendar, and by a start/end date range.

Click an event's name to open and edit it. To remove events, check the box beside one or more of them and use the delete action. If registration is turned on, this list also shows how many people are confirmed and how many are on the waiting list.

4 Attach agendas, minutes, and other files

Open an event and use the Meeting Files tab to upload documents that belong with a meeting: Agenda, Minutes, Audio, Video, Staff Report, Bill, Ordinance, and Resolution. Each uploaded file appears with a link and a small Delete checkbox you can tick (then Save) to remove it.

Tip: These file slots are what make a meeting record complete and searchable for the public — upload the agenda before the meeting and the minutes afterward.

5 Let people register (reservations)

To collect sign-ups for an event, open it and go to the Reservation tab. Turn on Reservations Enabled, then set the limits that fit your event:

Maximum number of reservations for the whole event.
Maximum per person, so no one grabs every spot.
A registration close date/time after which sign-ups stop.
A confirmation message, a waiting-list message, and an optional disclaimer registrants must acknowledge.

Save the event. Once people begin signing up, review them at Left menu › Meetings & Events › Event Registration. Pick the event from the dropdown to see who registered, how many attendees each requested, and the running totals for confirmed and waiting-list spots. You can also export the list.

6 Set your Event Registration Settings

Go to Left menu › Meetings & Events › Event Registration Settings to set the defaults that apply to registration across your whole site:

Reservation Notification Email — where sign-up notifications are sent.
From Email Address — the address confirmation emails come from.
Reservations Title on Portal — the wording shown to the public on the sign-up page.
Options for whether an organization name is shown or required when someone signs up.

Click Save Settings. You only need to set these once, and they apply to every event that has registration turned on.

Event field reference

Field	What it does
Title	The event's name, shown on the calendar and event page.
Start / End	When the event begins and ends.
All Day	Marks the event as all-day, with no specific clock time.
Show in these calendars	Which calendar(s) the event appears on. At least one is required.
Description	The event details, written in the Page Editor.
Location	Where the event takes place.
Cost Description	Free-text cost or fee information.
Contact Email / Phone	Who to reach with questions.
Highlighted on calendar	Makes the event stand out visually on the calendar.
Reservations Enabled	Turns public sign-ups on for this event.
Maximum reservations / per person	Caps total sign-ups and per-person sign-ups.

Next steps

Add a calendar link to your site navigation in the Menus guide, and learn the shared editor used for event descriptions in the Page Editor guide. Running formal board meetings? See the SimpleAgendas guide.

Need a hand? Contact EvoGov support or visit help.evogov.com.