back to the
main page
Procurement Officials Brace for Changes to Accessibility Laws
The economic downturn won’t be the only challenge facing public sector agencies in the months ahead: procurement officers will also have to negotiate potentially sweeping changes to laws designed to make software and hardware easy to use by disabled employees and constituents.
Within the U.S., changes to the 8-year-old Section 508 accessibility regulations, which are expected to be finalized late this year or in 2010, are particularly important for federal agencies, which were criticized in an Office of Management and Budget audit released late 2007 that found only 3 percent of federal contracts correctly incorporated accessibility requirements. Although not required to adopt Section 508, most U.S. state and local agencies are also watching the revision process with interest because they’ve developed standards that mirror and in some cases extend those rules.
Outside of the U.S. similar changes are also occurring, including Mandate 376 in the European Union, BSI 8878 Web Accessibility in the U.K., and the Common Look and Feel Standards in Canada.
Most accessibility laws are changing in step with an update to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). Version 1.0 was introduced in 1999, and version 2.0 was published at the end of 2008. This widely anticipated revision represents a significant clarification of existing standards and acknowledges the rapid evolution of Web technologies.
“Public sector agencies are taking the revisions very seriously,” says Peter Wallack, director of Oracle’s accessibility program. The program spearheads Oracle’s efforts to make its software accessible by making changes that allow it to be compatible with screen readers and other tools used by the estimated 15 percent of the world’s population that have physical or sight impairments. “We’re definitely not expecting anyone to back down on compliance, despite the pressures of the current economic crisis,” he adds.
When the changes become law, procurement executives will need to incorporate the rules into new acquisitions. A particular challenge will center on software upgrades. “If a customer upgrades to a new release, will that be considered a new procurement that must meet the revisions? That’s always a gray area,” Wallack says. “In the U.S., we’ll be looking for new FAR [Federal Acquisition Regulation] language to clarify this.”
In addition to meeting government mandates, agencies have practical reasons for making their technology easier to use as the average age of public sector employees continues to rise. “There’s a whole generation of workers that’s grown up with technology, and they’re going to expect to keep using it as they get older,” Wallack explains. “To do that they’re going to need some of the elements we support in our applications, including large font sizes and not forcing people to distinguish colors when working with user interfaces.”
For more information, visit Oracle’s Accessibility Web site.
back to the top
|
