WASHINGTON – Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman ID-Conn., and Ranking Member Susan Collins R-Me., announced Monday the Committee has been named one of the best Web sites in Congress by the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF), a non-profit, non-partisan management consulting and research organization in Washington, D.C.
The site, www.hsgac.senate.gov was one of 104 Web sites commended in The 2007 Gold Mouse Report: Lessons from the Best Web Sites on Capitol Hill. To identify the awards, CMF analyzed 618 congressional Web sites, including those of all Senate and House Members, committees, majority and minority sites, and official leadership sites. In 2007, CMF awarded 36 Gold, 34 Silver, and 34 Bronze Mouse Awards. HSGAC received the Bronze Award this year and last year.
“We take great pride in our website and, therefore, I am pleased that it has been recognized for this distinguished honor,” HSGAC Staff Director Michael Alexander said. “As we have done in the past, we will continue to work to improve the site so that it provides the public with relevant information in a fast and accessible manner.”
The web site for Senator Lieberman’s personal office was also honored with a Silver Mouse Award this year. The 2007 Gold Mouse Report and Awards are part of the “Connecting to Congress” research project, funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation. For this project CMF partnered with researchers from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, University of California-Riverside and Ohio State University to study how Members of Congress can use the Internet to improve communications with their constituents and to promote greater participation in the legislative process.
Web sites were graded on how well they incorporate five basic building blocks which extensive research identified as critical for effectiveness: audience, content, usability, interactivity, and innovation. Using these building blocks, an evaluation framework was developed by CMF and their research partners at Harvard, Ohio State, and the University of California-Riverside which would be fair and objective while still taking into account important qualitative factors that affect a visitor’s experience on a Web site.
A full copy of the report, the 2007 Gold Mouse Report: Lessons from the Best Web Sites on Capitol Hill, is available on the Congressional Management Foundation’s Web site at www.cmfweb.org.