R.I. finalist in ‘Best of the Web’ competition

PROVIDENCE – The Rhode Island state website was named a finalist in the Center for Digital Government’s annual “Best of the Web” competition.
The website – www.ri.gov – was one of five recognized as finalists in the competition’s state portal category, joining Kentucky, Maine, Maryland and Oregon.

Rhode Island’s website, which receives 74,000 unique monthly visitors, was noted by the center for its minimalist design, which was done to make the site simpler to navigate. The center also noted that it was realigned to reflect Gov. Gina M. Raimondo’s four core priorities: making the state more business friendly, using e-government services to maximize efficiency, increasing transparency and growing tourism. In addition, the state added an animal shelter Web service this past year, to better track animal populations and shelter demands, the center said.
The website had nearly 1.2 million online transactions in 2014, each of which prevented a resident from visiting a state office in person. State officials also said that Rhode Island was first in the nation to embrace “responsive and mobile-first Web design.”
Arkansas’ state website took top honors overall in the state portal category, followed by Utah, Indiana, Mississippi and Texas.
The awards highlight outstanding agency and department websites and applications. Awards were presented in eight categories.
“These winners are recognized for responsive and mobile-first design, open government, open data, improved transparency and integration with social media,” Todd Sander, executive director of the Center for Digital Government, said in a statement. “Congratulations to the awardees for their impressive work to make government more accessible and responsive to citizens.”

The awards also were noted by Kansas-based NIC Inc., a provider of eGovernment services which works with all 10 states recognized.
“Congratulations to our state government partners in Arkansas, as well as all of our state government partners honored in the 2015 Best of the Web competition,” Robert Knapp, NIC chief operating officer, said. “We are very proud of our partners and our employees for working together to produce state portals that deliver a dynamic user experience and efficient access to a wealth of information and online services. We look forward to partnering in the future to deliver even more innovation and efficiencies.”
The Center for Digital Government is an international research and advisory institute studying information technology in government. The Best of the Web Awards will be presented Sept. 25 in New Orleans.

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