We thank the Great Lakes ADA Center for providing us the following information about a proposal that assesses the monetary value of captioning web content for people with hearing impairments.

The Department of Justice published a Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) Notice in the Federal Register on 5/12/16 indicating that the Department will submit an information collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval.  The proposed information collection is titled Assessing the Potential Monetized Benefits of Captioning Web Content for Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing and is intended to solicit information about the perceived monetary value of captioning on Web sites from individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing.  The Department is not suggesting that people with disabilities be asked to pay for captioning, but is merely soliciting information about the theoretical monetary value that they place on the captioning of Web content in order to help the Department quantify the benefits of captioning on Web sites. The Department hopes the information collected will assist it in the preparation of future regulatory assessments, which are required by Executive Order 12866 and Executive Order 13563.

Written comments and suggestions from the public and affected agencies are encouraged. Comments will be accepted until July 11, 2016. The PRA Notice provides more detailed information on the types of comments that the Department is seeking. More information can be found on the www.ada.gov website under the “New on ADA.Gov” section.