Website Accessibility

1. Website Accessibility By Shanna Chalker State of Arizona Government Information Technology Agency October 21, 2004

2. Agenda • Do the 508 guidelines apply to State and local governments? • State accessibility guidelines, approach, and implementation • Advice for local governments

3. Accessibility Section 508 -vs- ADA – American Disabilities Act Do the 508 guidelines apply to State and local governments? If so, how?

4. Accessibility • Federal - Section 508 • This is the most recent law relating to accessibility and is often referred to as "Section 508." In 1998, the president signed into law the Workforce Investment Act, which amended Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1986 and significantly expanded and strengthened the technology access requirements of the 1986 act. • In effect, the new law requires that federal procurement of electronic and information technology after August 2000 must be accessible to federal employees who have disabilities and to members of the public with disabilities who need to use that technology. States that receive federal funds under the Assistive Technology Act of 1998 are also required to comply with Section 508. Section 508 also applies to Web sites that are produced for government agencies. • For additional information about Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, visit: http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/508/508home.html and http://www.access-board.gov/.

5. Accessibility What if you don’t receive federal funds? Would you still want to follow these guidelines? • Everyone Benefits From Accessible Web Sites • slow Internet connections • devices that do not show color • devices such as cell phones that have tiny screens • An increase in your customer base • Compliance with worldwide regulations and standards • Who is using your website?

6. Arizona @ Your Service Site Statistics

7. Disabilities among U.S. adults Nation's largest minority group source : President's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities 54.76 Million disabled (18.7% of US population not including learning disabilities) 750 million worldwide source : McNeil (1997), Americans with Disabilities: 1994-95 http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/disable/sipp/disable9495.html

8. Disability issues and needs • Vision impaired • low vision: -may have perception problems -need enlarged fonts, high contrast, or screen magnifiers • colorblindness: -unable to see color differences -need information regardless of color • blindness: - unable to see the screen or use a mouse -need a Braille display or screen reader software to "see" the screen and use the keyboard for navigation • Deaf and hard of hearing - unable to hear sounds and warning beeps - need captions and show sounds • Mobility impaired -limited or no ability to use hands or fingers -limited range, speed, strength -unable to press multiple keys -unable to control pressing a key -need access keys and alternative input methods such as speech recognition • Attention/Reading -difficulty reading & writing -difficulty comprehending and expressing thoughts -need reading, writing, and comprehension aids; speech synthesis for reading; speech recognition or word prediction software for writing • Combinations -technologies need to coexist

9. Web Accessibility What the sighted see What the blind hear

10. Accessibility • State accessibility guidelines, approach, and implementation • Basic approach to making websites accessible Policies, Standards, and Procedures (PSP)

11. STATE of ARIZONA Accessibility Policy • AUTHORITY • The Government Information Technology Agency (GITA) shall develop, implement and maintain a coordinated statewide plan for information technology (IT) (A.R.S. § 41-3504(A (1))) including the adoption of statewide technical, coordination, and IT Policy and Standards (A.R.S. § 41-3504(A (1(a)))). • PURPOSE • To establish a statewide policy that provides an accessibility model for the development and implementation of Arizona State government web sites that minimizes technical barriers to accessibility for individuals with disabilities. • SCOPE • This applies to all budget units. Budget unit is defined as a department, commission, board, institution or other agency of the state organization receiving, expending or disbursing state funds or incurring obligations of the state including the board of regents and the state board of directors for community colleges but excluding the universities under the jurisdiction of the board of regents and the community colleges under their respective jurisdictions and the legislative or judicial branches. A.R.S. § 41-3501(2). • The Budget Unit Chief Executive Officer (CEO), working in conjunction with the Budget Unit Chief Information Officer (CIO), shall be responsible for ensuring the effective implementation of Statewide Information Technology Policies, Standards, Procedures (PSPs) within each budget unit. • POLICY • To provide an accessibility model in which web content authors, format designers, and software developers within State agencies understand their roles in providing persons with disabilities, access to existing and developing State web sites. This model is designed for the general public with disabilities who are able to handle general-purpose web content under ordinary operating conditions, see Attachment A –Web Site Accessibility Technical Suggestions and Examples, for further specifics.

12. The accessibility policy consists of the following web page features that are to be addressed for all State web sites: • GRAPHICS • Simple images; linked images; content images; graphical text; ASCII Art; list bullets; spacer images; animated graphics–text equivalent; animated graphics-frame rate. • INFORMATION IN COLOR • Information in color; color contrast. • MOVING CONTENT • Static background color; moving text. • DOWNLOADABLE FILES • Graphics in downloadable files; PDF files. • REPETITIVE CONTENT • Skipping navigation links. • DATA TABLES • Identifying row and column headers; using SCOPE to group table cells. • MULTIMEDIA • Sounds 10; speech-short clips (up to 60 seconds); speech-long clips; video-short clips (up to 10 seconds); video-long clips. • IMAGE MAPS • Image map graphics-text equivalent; client-side image map regions; server-side image map regions. • STYLE SHEETS • Style sheets. • FORMS • Forms-label placement; forms-associating labels and controls; forms-time responses. • SCRIPTS • Scripts-text equivalents; scripts-keyboard accessibility. • APPLETS and PLUG-INS • Applets and plug-ins-links; applets and plug-ins-text equivalent information or functionality. • FRAMES • Frames-labeling; frames-NOFRAMES elements. • KEYBOARD CONTROL • Keyboard control. • TEXT-ONLY PAGES • Text-only versions. • BIOMETRIC IDENTIFICATION • Alternative identification. • EQUIVALENT FACILITATION • Equivalent access.

13. Accessibility • State and Federal requirements are different

14. Section 508 of Fed Rehabilitation Act • Requires U.S. federal agencies to purchase information technology that is accessible to people with disabilities • Applies to: • Software applications and operating systems • Web-based intranet and Internet information and applications • Telecommunications products • Video and multimedia products • Self-contained, closed products (printers, copiers, fax machines, etc.) • Desktop and portable computers • Published December 2000, enforced June 2001 • Risk losing sales if products are not accessible. • Opportunity to win more sales if products are accessible. • www.section508.gov

15. Accessibility • Worldwide - W3C • Regulatory compliance is also an important reason to produce accessible Web sites in other countries. For example, the Nordic countries have published their own set of accessibility guidelines, and Portugal and Thailand have recently introduced legislation that directly requires Web accessibility. Other countries, such as Australia and Canada, have legislation that makes it a civil right for individuals with disabilities to be able to access certain kinds of information. • Additional information about these and other policies is available from the World Wide Web Consortium's Web Accessibility Initiative at: http://www.w3.org/WAI/References/Policy

16. Accessibility • Advice for local governments

17. Making IT accessible • Establish an accessibility policy • Include people who have disabilities and assistive technologies • Assign accessibility coordination on project teams • Planning, Design, Architecture, Usability, Graphics, Testing, and Development • Follow accessibility guidelines during design and development • Software (all functions available using the keyboard, ...) • Web sites (alt="text" on all images, ...) • Java applications (use Java Accessibility API, ...) • Notes databases (alternatives for graphical navigators, ...) • Hardware (easy to reach and operate switches, ...) • Use tools that ensure the output is accessible • Consult with the Accessibility experts • Interpret existing guidelines and standards, address new situations • Test - using testing techniques and tools • Share best practices with others