Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Disability; Accessibility of Web Information and Services of State and Local Government Entities

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE <CFR>28 CFR Part 35</CFR> <DEPDOC>[CRT Docket No. 144; AG Order No. 5919-2024]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1190-AA79</RIN> <SUBJECT>Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Disability; Accessibility of Web Information and Services of State and Local Government Entities</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Civil Rights Division, Department of Justice. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Department of Justice (“Department”) issues its final rule revising the regulation implementing title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) to establish specific requirements, including the adoption of specific technical standards, for making accessible the services, programs, and activities offered by State and local government entities to the public through the web and mobile applications (“apps”). </SUM> <DATES> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> <E T="03">Effective date:</E> This rule is effective June 24, 2024. <E T="03">Compliance dates:</E> A public entity, other than a special district government, with a total population of 50,000 or more shall begin complying with this rule April 24, 2026. A public entity with a total population of less than 50,000 or any public entity that is a special district government shall begin complying with this rule April 26, 2027. <E T="03">Incorporation by reference:</E> The incorporation by reference of certain material listed in the rule is approved by the Director of the Federal Register as of June 24, 2024. </DATES> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Rebecca B. Bond, Chief, Disability Rights Section, Civil Rights Division, U.S. Department of Justice, at (202) 307-0663 (voice or TTY). This is not a toll-free number. Information may also be obtained from the Department's toll-free ADA Information Line at (800) 514-0301 (voice) or 1-833-610-1264 (TTY). You may obtain copies of this rule in an alternative format by calling the ADA Information Line at (800) 514-0301 (voice) or 1-833-610-1264 (TTY). This rule is also available on <E T="03">www.ada.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Executive Summary</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Purpose of and Need for the Rule</HD> Title II of the ADA provides that no qualified individual with a disability shall, by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in or denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of a public entity. <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> The Department has consistently made clear that the title II nondiscrimination requirements apply to all services, programs, and activities of public entities (also referred to as “government services”), including those provided via the web. It also includes those provided via mobile apps. <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> In this rule, the Department establishes technical standards for web content and mobile app accessibility to give public entities greater clarity in exactly how to meet their ADA obligations and to help ensure equal access to government services for individuals with disabilities. <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  42 U.S.C. 12132. The Department uses the phrases “State and local government entities” and “public entities” interchangeably throughout this rule to refer to “public entit[ies]” as defined in 42 U.S.C. 12131(1) that are covered under part A of title II of the ADA. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  As discussed in the proposed definition in this rule, mobile apps are software applications that are downloaded and designed to run on mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets. </FTNT> Public entities are increasingly providing the public access to government services through their web content and mobile apps. For example, government websites and mobile apps often allow the public to obtain information or correspond with local officials without having to wait in line or be placed on hold. Members of the public can also pay fines, apply for State benefits, renew State-issued identification, register to vote, file taxes, obtain up-to-date health and safety resources, request copies of vital records, access mass transit schedules, and complete numerous other tasks via government websites. Individuals can perform many of these same functions on mobile apps. Often, however, State and local government entities' web- and mobile app-based services are not designed or built accessibly and as a result are not equally available to individuals with disabilities. Just as stairs can exclude people who use wheelchairs from accessing government buildings, inaccessible web content and mobile apps can exclude people with a range of disabilities from accessing government services. It is critical to ensure that individuals with disabilities can access important web content and mobile apps quickly, easily, independently, privately, and equally. Accessible web content and mobile apps help to make this possible. By allowing individuals with disabilities to engage more fully with their governments, accessible web content and mobile apps also promote the equal enjoyment of fundamental constitutional rights, such as rights with respect to speech, assembly, association, petitioning, voting, and due process of law. Accordingly, the Department is establishing technical requirements to provide concrete standards to public entities on how to fulfill their obligations under title II to provide equal access to all of their services, programs, and activities that are provided via the web and mobile apps. The Department believes, and public comments have reinforced, that the requirements described in this rule are necessary to assure “equality of opportunity, full participation, independent living, and economic self-sufficiency” for individuals with disabilities, as set forth in the ADA. <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>3</SU>  42 U.S.C. 12101(a)(7). </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD2">B. Legal Authority</HD> On July 26, 1990, President George H.W. Bush signed into law the ADA, a comprehensive civil rights law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of disability. <SU>4</SU> <FTREF/> Title II of the ADA, which this rule addresses, applies to State and local government entities. Title II extends the prohibition on discrimination established by section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (“Rehabilitation Act”), as amended, 29 U.S.C. 794 (“section 504”), to all activities of State and local government entities regardless of whether the entities receive Federal financial assistance. <SU>5</SU> <FTREF/> Part A of title II protects qualified individuals with disabilities from discrimination on the basis of disability in services, programs, and activities of State and local government entities. Section 204(a) of the ADA directs the Attorney General to issue regulations implementing part A of title II but exempts matters within the scope of the authority of the Secretary of Transportation under section 223, 229, or 244. <SU>6</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>4</SU>  42 U.S.C. 12101-12213. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>5</SU>  42 U.S.C. 12131-12165. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>6</SU>   <E T="03">See</E> 42 U.S.C. 12134. Section 229(a) and section 244 of the ADA direct the Secretary of Transportation to issue regulations implementing part B of title II, except for section 223. <E T="03">See</E> 42 U.S.C. 12149(a), 12164. </FTNT> The Department is the only Federal agency with authority to issue regulations under title II, part A, of the ADA regarding the accessibility of State and local government entities' web content and mobile apps. In addition, under Executive Order 12250, the Department is responsible for ensuring consistency and effectiveness in the implementation of section 504 across the Federal Government (aside from provisions relating to equal employment). <SU>7</SU> <FTREF/> Given Congress's intent for parity between section 504 and title II of the ADA, the Department must also ensure the consistency of any related agency interpretations of those provisions. <SU>8</SU> <FTREF/> The Department, therefore, also has a lead role in coordinating interpretations of section 504 (again, aside from provisions relating to equal employment), including its application to web content and mobile apps, across the Federal Government. <FTNT> <SU>7</SU>  E.O. 12250 secs. 1-201(c), 1-503 (Nov. 2, 1980), 45 FR 72995, 72995, 72997 (Nov. 4, 1980). </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>8</SU>  U.S. Dep't of Just., <E T="03">Disability Rights Section: Federal Coordination of Section 504 and Title II of the ADA,</E> C.R. Div. (Oct. 12, 2021), <E T="03">https://www.justice.gov/crt/disability-rights-section#:~:text=Federal%20Coordination%20of%20Section%20504,required%20by%20Executive%20Order%2012250</E> [ <E T="03">https://perma.cc/S5JX-WD82</E> ] (see Civil Rights Division (CRT) Memorandum on Federal Agencies' Implementation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act under the heading “Section 504 and ADA Federal Coordination Resources”). </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD2">C. Organization of This Rule</HD> Appendix D to 28 CFR part 35 provides a section-by-section analysis of the Department's changes to the title II regulation and the reasoning behind those changes, in addition to responses to public comments received on the notice of proposed rulemaking (“NPRM”). <SU>9</SU> <FTREF/> The section of appendix D entitled “Public Comments on Other Issues in Response to NPRM” discusses public comments on several issues that are not otherwise specifically addressed in the section-by-section analysis. The Final Regulatory Impact Analysis (“FRIA”) and Final Regulatory Flexibility Analysis (“FRFA”) accompanying this rulemaking both contain further responses to comments relating to those analyses. <FTNT> <SU>9</SU>  88 F ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 720k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━