News
We thank the Great Lakes ADA Center for providing us with the following information about an opportunity to participate in a survey about transportation for people with disabilities.
We would like to invite you to participate in a national survey titled, Transportation Access and Experiences, which is designed to improve understanding of accessibility of public transportation for people with disabilities. This survey is being conducted by the ADA Participation Action Research Consortium (ADA-PARC), a collaborative research project of ADA Regional Centers (PIs: Lex Frieden and Joy Hammel). This project focuses on community living, community participation & work/economic participation disparities of people with disabilities (For more information, visit the website:www.adaparc.org). We would like to improve our understanding on transportation access of people with disabilities and use this information to make improvements at regional and national levels.
We are very interested in receiving as many responses as possible from people with disabilities based on their personal experiences with public transportation. The results will serve as crucial evidence to support improvements to accessible transportation.
Please use the link below to access and complete the survey. The online survey can be completed in English or Spanish. This is the second round of data collection for this survey, so if you have already completed it, please do not complete the survey again.
If you would like to complete the survey by phone in English, please contact the research team at 312-996-9655. If you would like to complete the survey by phone in Spanish, please contact Ancel Montenelli at 312-413-1439. Please mention that you are calling about the ADA transportation survey.
If you have any questions or comments regarding this survey, please contact Jill Bezyak from the Rocky Mountain ADA Center at jill.bezyak@unco.edu.
WKOW: Wisconsin Heights/Barneveld track star doesn't let disability hold him back
By SD Network, 2016-06-01
For Wisconsin Heights/Barnveld junior Brenden Ojibway, spring is about Track and Field. Despite using a wheelchair, he competes in the 400 meter, 800 meter, and shot put. Thanks to the WIAA incorporating wheelchair athletics, Brenden has the chance to compete.
The Autism Society of Wisconsin is conducting a survey for individuals with autism, parents/caregivers, and professionals affected by autism. The survey is an opportunity for you and others to share your experiences and thoughts to influence our programs and legislative priorities. The survey will be repeated in the future so we can track how attitudes and experiences change over time. A report with survey results will be published later this year.
The survey takes approximately 10 - 20 minutes to complete. Those who enter their contact information at the end will be entered to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card. The survey will close on June 3rd.
Please consider taking the survey and sharing with others!
A new study finds that many families of those with disabilities who had to transition from institutions to community living are happy with the results. Oklahoma families whose relatives were part of a mandatory deinstitutionalization process in 2015 were assessed. There was some opposition at first, but the study found that family members are now satisfied with their relatives' current living situation.
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.
The National Council on Disability recent a letter to the US Department of Treasury asking that the agency move forward to make the dollar bill accessible to people with visual disabilities. In 2008, there was a lawsuit that ruled that the current form of the dollar bill violates the Americans with Disabilities Act. Disability advocates were told that the braille cells would be included in the redesigned ten-dollar bill, but accessibility issues seemed to have disappeared in the discussion about the bills' redesign.
HUFFINGTON POST: New App Will Serve As ‘TripAdvisor’ For People With Disabilities
By SD Network, 2016-06-01
A new app is helping travelers with disabilities find accessible hotels. Much like the TripAdvisor website, users will answer questions and write reviews based on the accessibility of the hotel. The engineers are working to add sensory and cognitive disability criteria in the future. The full version of the app is expected to be available this summer.
THE ARC BLOG: DOL Releases New Overtime Final Rule-Including Non-Enforcement for Some Medicaid Providers
By SD Network, 2016-05-19
The Department of Labor released its final rule for overtime workers. It also released a non-enforcement policy for providers of Medicaid-funded services for individuals with intellectual or developmental disabilities in residential homes and facilities with 15 or fewer beds. Both the overtime rule and the non-enforcement policy will take effect on December 1, 2016.