Just as the flowers bloom and come to life again in Washington, D.C., Springtime often brings a flurry of activity from the federal government. Our Public Policy Research Institute (PPRI) has been tracking the activity, and would like to share two key recent actions that have taken root and could yield positive fruit for people who are blind or have low vision.
First, the Department of Justice (DOJ), along with the General Services Administration (GSA), released a long-awaited report on the state of federal agencies’ compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act. The report specifically addressed website accessibility. Second, the Supreme Court issued an opinion in the case Luna Perez v. Sturgis Public Schools that questioned the process for how students with disabilities and their families pursue legal action under laws other than the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).
Are Federal websites accessible?
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act is an important law requiring the U.S. federal government to buy and develop accessible Information and Communication Technology (ICT). ICT includes websites, mobile apps, kiosks, computer equipment, and telecommunications equipment. When Congress amended Section 508 in 1998, it required the Attorney General to prepare a report on the state of Federal agency ICT accessibility every two years. However, the last report had been released twelve years ago in 2011.
Therefore, we are thrilled that the DOJ and GSA assembled the resources and time to release a new report. Notably, this release comes at a time when AFB and many others are advocating for greater digital accessibility in government, commerce, education, healthcare, and more. The report provides us with data to assess federal compliance with the law rather than relying solely on anecdotal reports.
The report covers 24 agencies that the GSA requires to report some accessibility data and some additional agencies that reported voluntarily. Agencies reported on the accessibility of a sample of their webpages and intranet pages, the accessibility of their top ten downloaded PDF documents, and the status of their webpage accessibility statements. GSA also asked agencies to self-report the maturity of their accessibility programs in the areas of acquisition, lifecycle activities, complaints, testing, and training.
The report finds that for the agencies reporting:
- 90% of tested Internet webpages were reported to be accessible. However, when a single agency’s webpages are removed, that number drops to only 70%.
- Only 41% of Intranet pages were reported to be accessible, and 3 agencies reported not testing these internal pages at all.
- 74% of PDF documents downloaded contain one or more accessibility issue requiring remediation.
- While 90% of the 58 agency web domains tested have an accessibility statement, 55% of agencies require some remediation to meet the requirements.
- Only 2 of the agencies gave themselves the highest possible score across all five programmatic maturity categories.
Although the report suggests that there has been improvement over time, AFB remains deeply concerned that people who are blind, have low vision, or deaf-blind are likely to face barriers when using federal government websites and PDFs. These barriers appear to be even more prevalent for federal workers using agency intranets. We are also concerned that this data may only represent a sliver of government webpages and excludes small agencies that do not voluntarily report compliance data. Government agencies must commit the resources necessary to make websites, documents, and intranet sites accessible to the public and to their employees.
In the future, we would like to see DOJ and GSA collect additional information that further illustrates the state of federal government website and app accessibility. In order to really understand how agencies are performing, we need measurable data beyond whether a webpage is accessible or not. It is also critical that all agencies — not just the largest agencies — report and be held accountable. AFB would also like to see additional information about the number of untested pages, a description of the testing methods used, and the most common barriers that have been identified in testing.
Supreme Court rules that an education-related ADA lawsuit can proceed
The Supreme Court recently heard a case addressing a question about how students with disabilities may seek additional legal relief under laws other than the IDEA. In this case, a Deaf student in Michigan had previously settled with his school district after alleging that the district provided him with unqualified sign language interpreters and misrepresented his academic progress. The student and district agreed in the settlement to a range of forward-looking remedies, such as additional schooling at the Michigan School for the Deaf, that were available under the IDEA.
Later, his family sought to sue the district under a separate law, the Americans with Disabilities Act, seeking compensatory damages that are not available under the IDEA. However, the district argued that the IDEA precludes lawsuits under other laws unless the student exhausts all administrative procedures outlined in IDEA. The student’s family contended that that requirement only applies to litigation seeking relief available under the IDEA.
When the lower-level courts agreed with the school district and dismissed the case, the student and his family appealed to the Supreme Court. In the opinion released this week, the Supreme Court ultimately sided with the student and his family, allowing the case to proceed. The lower courts now must hear the merits of the case, and students with disabilities have greater clarity about how to seek compensatory damages under the ADA for education-related disputes. AFB is pleased that the Court affirmed the right of students with disabilities to seek remedies under the Americans with Disabilities Act without having to pursue additional administrative procedures for cases that extend beyond the scope of the IDEA. We will continue to monitor the progress of this case as it works its way through the courts.
