San Ramon Valley Fire Protection District Nominated for Webby Award
The district is one of five government sites worldwide to receive the nomination by the Digital Academy of International Arts and Sciences, based in New York City.
The San Ramon Valley Fire Protection District's Web site is one of five government sites including NASA, U.S. Census and the U.S. Air Force, nominated for a Webby Award by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences Tuesday.
The Webby is the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet. The Fire District's site is nominated in the category of best government Web site.
"For firedepartment.org to be nominated in the same category as Web sites for the U.S. Census Bureau, NASA and the U.S. Air Force is quite an accomplishment for our District," said Fire Chief Richard Price. "We are honored by this recognition."
The Webby Awards are presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences in New York City, a 650-person judging academy including Internet co-inventor Vinton Cerf, "The Simpson's" creator Matt Groening, Arianna Huffington, and Harvey Weinstein.
This year the Academy received 10,000 entries from over 60 countries.
"Nominees like firedepartment.org are setting the standard for innovation and creativity on the Internet," said David-Michel Davies, executive director of the Webby Awards. "It is an incredible achievement to be selected as one the best from the millions of sites in existence."
Webby winners will be announced on May 4th, 2010 and honored at a ceremony in New York City on June 14.
Firedepartment.org launched April 1, 2009 after a community survey asking residents what they wanted to see on the new Web site.
The new site includes real-time 9-1-1 dispatch activity, live emergency radio traffic, photo and video galleries, an interactive page for kids and helpful tools and information for local businesses and residents. Users can zoom-in on live incidents by controlling video cameras mounted on ridge top communication towers. They can also sign up to receive announcements and incident alerts via Twitter feeds.
As a nominee for a Webby Award, firedepartment.org is also eligible to win a Webby People's Voice Award via online vote until April 29th by visting www.firedepartment.org or http://webby.aol.com/society/government.
