New federal rules are now applying to local governments regarding the accessibility of digital media. But federal rules aren’t the only reason that accessibility matters when it comes to creating community resources. Equal access to information and resources surrounding climate action is critical to ensure every member of your community is prepared, protected, and proactive in resilience and sustainability in their personal lives.
As of April 2024, two new federal rules apply to all local governments regarding digital media (websites, PDFs, videos, etc.) and accessibility. Depending on the population of your community, you will have either until April 2026 or April 2027 to make sure that your websites comply with Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The two most relevant requirements under this rule are that “The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) Version 2.1, Level AA is the technical standard for state and local governments’ web content and mobile apps.” and “State and local governments’ web content usually needs to meet WCAG 2.1, Level AA.”
In addition to the Title II rule is the Department of Health and Human Services Section 504, which “prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in programs and activities that receive Federal financial assistance.”
Making the web more accessible is long overdue. In fact, at KLA, we have been intentionally working to make our KLA Community Dashboard even more accessible since Summer 2023. That’s when KLA prioritized improvements to our Dashboard product that met the requirements of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1. We teamed up with our Dashboard client the City of San Antonio, Texas and Perkins Access, the consulting arm of Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, MA, to bring our product into better compliance.
A Perkins Insights review was completed by a team of folks including a person who uses a screen reader and assistive technology when accessing the web. Perkins also reviewed the sites for compliance outside of assistive technology; such as color contrast and fonts for folks who have neurological disorders.
Based on the results of this review, we found that we were doing well but could make some improvements that would elevate the user experience. The following are some highlights of how our dashboards comply with the WCAG 2.1 requirements since the improvements made in 2023.
Accessible Updates on KLA Dashboards:
- Upon uploading an image for use on the website, all users are required to add Alt Text before it can be used anywhere on the site. This ensures that every image on the site has Alt Text for use by screen reader technology.
- Interactive charts and graphs are accessible for uses with assistive technology.
- Improved keyboard accessibility for all elements on the site.
- Text sizes meet or exceed all required minimums.
- Default color combinations on the sites meet or exceed the minimum contrast ratio.
- Where colors are customizable, information about color contrast is embedded in the application and available in the knowledge base to ensure correct colors are being chosen. All KLA staff are aware of the requirements when designing sites with their clients and suggesting appropriate colors.
- Font style is not customizable. This ensures readability for all visitors.
- We encourage all clients to add captions to the videos that they choose to create and upload.
Other notable measures:
- All information other than embedded content can be easily translated with the browser translation options.
- We aim to present all information at no more than an eighth grade reading level to make it as easily accessible as possible.
- Subscribers to the full-service dashboard get quarterly Quality Assurance / Quality Control (QAQC) reviews of their sites where we look out for inaccessible features among other quality checks.
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KLA will continue to assess the KLA Community Dashboard to ensure that all public facing content meets the WCAG 2.1 guidelines prior to the April 2026 deadline.
To learn more about how new federal rulings apply to local governments, we encourage you to seek out more information by reviewing the fact sheets for Title II and Section 504. Perkins Access of Perkins School for the Blind is another great resource that we highly recommend for help interpreting these rules.
