Maryland Department of Natural Resources App Receives Top Honors

The Maryland Department of Natural Resources is pleased to be among the winners recently announced in the 2016 MarCom Awards competition. The department’s AccessDNR mobile app was awarded the Platinum MarCom Award, the competition’s highest honor, in the “App for Information” category.

“Our mobile app is a great way to connect with our state’s precious natural resources through a mobile device,” said Maryland Natural Resources Secretary Mark Belton. “The interactive app provides up-to-date information, news and resources for anglers, hunters, state park visitors and more. We’re pleased that more than 46,000 citizens are actively using our app and partnering with us to enhance and improve our services.”

The MarCom competition has grown to perhaps the largest of its kind with about 6,000 entries per year recognizing excellence in terms of creativity, quality, and resourcefulness. Winners were selected from over 200 categories and were judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals. Judges are industry professionals who look for companies and individuals whose talent exceeds a high standard of excellence and work serves as a benchmark for the industry.

The AccessDNR mobile and Apple Watch app provides all the information and services outdoor enthusiasts need on the go. The app uses geolocation functionality to locate and provide directions to the top 10 closest water access points or water trails for boaters, paddlers, anglers, and swimmers. The location-based “Near Me” mapping function displays parks and waterways in radius increments of 10, 25, or 50 miles of the user and includes detailed driving directions.

AccessDNR mobile app features:

• Location-based maps and directions to state-owned parks, wildlife areas, trails, boat launches, and water access sites
• Maryland State Park activities and amenities by location
• Hunting season information by date
• Real-time game harvest reporting directly to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources
• Trophy case photo sharing through social media
• Location-based sunrise/sunset and tide updates
• Maryland fish and shellfish identifier
• Hunting, fishing, and boating regulation guides
• Breaking news and alerts, including hunting calendar and regulations

The AccessDNR mobile app and Apple Watch app can be downloaded from the Apple App Store or through Google Play App Store for Android users.

The AccessDNR mobile app and Apple Watch app were developed at no charge for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources by NIC Inc., through the self-funded digital government services contract with the Maryland Department of Information Technology.

About NIC Maryland

NIC Maryland builds, operates, maintains, and markets the official website of the state of Maryland, www.maryland.gov and its digital government services. NIC Maryland is a collaborative public/private partnership managed by the Department of Information Technology (DoIT) and NIC Maryland. NIC Maryland helps Maryland state and local government entities web-enable their services and operates without tax funds through a self-funded digital government services contract. NIC Maryland has developed dozens of eGov products and services for the state of Maryland since the contract was awarded in August 2011.

About NIC

Founded in 1992, NIC (NASDAQ: EGOV) is the nation's leading provider of innovative digital government solutions and secure payment processing, which help make government more accessible to everyone through technology. The family of NIC companies provides digital government solutions for more than 4,500 federal, state, and local agencies in the United States. Forbes has named NIC as one of the “100 Best Small Companies in America” six times and the company has been included four times on the Barron’s 400 Index. Additional information is available at http://www.egov.com.

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