Good Morning,

And welcome to beautiful downtown Gaithersburg. I’m Rex Lint, and I chair the Section 508 Working Group of the ITAA. I’m pleased to be here today to speak on behalf of the IT industry this conference on Accessibility

I’d like to take a couple of minutes to introduce ITAA. ITAA is the Information Technology Association of American. This year, ITAA celebrates it’s 40^th year as a trade association representing the interests of the IT industry. It was born in 1961 as ADAPSO, when Information Technology was call Automatic Data Processing. ITAA is a trade association and has more than 500 members from the IT and Telecom industries.

ITAA lists among it’s members the largest IT companies in the world who’s revenues total in the hundreds of billions of dollars: IBM, Motorola, SUN, Compaq, Oracle, and Microsoft to name but a few.

ITAA is also the incubator of the smallest, too. New startups and smaller firms find they get the attention to the issues they need, too. Even the sole proprietor finds benefit from linking up with others in the business. Including me!

ITAA’s 500 members cover every aspect of the IT industry. There are software companies like Computer Associates and Microsoft. There are IT Service companies like EDS and KPMG. There are Application Service Providers like XXX and digital content companies such as YYY, telecom companies like EEE and enterprise solution vendors like XXX. And there are consulting companies from the largest to the smallest, all with vested interests in the IT industry.

What does ITAA offer to companies? What makes them band together? ITAA gives them a louder voice on the topics of importance to them. It helps them sort through issues and find common positions. It gives them a venue through which to exercise leadership on the topics which they have vital interests.

ITAA is more than just a US trade association, though. There is a sister organization in Canada: the IT Association of Canada or ITAC. Just a parenthetical note: almost every association concerned with accessibility is called ITAC, it’s just spelled 4 or 5 different ways. My point is that you’ll find a sister organization to ITAA in 41 different countries.

This goes one step further. Even the IT societies have a voice. They have joined together under the banner of the World IT Societies Association, or "WITSA." The president of WITSA happens to be Harris Miller, who is also president of ITAA.

The common policy issues identified by ITAA include:

Information security and privacy – more and more of a business’s value is contained in its computing infrastructure that needs protection from hackers or other unwelcome attack. At a more micro level, protection of a consumer’s information has become a subject of debate.

The companies voice common positions on exemption for R&D expenses, for the issues of protection of digital intellectual property. The organization is a catalyst for developing positions on telecommunications competition.

The shortage of IT workers drove ITAA to work immigration issues and get legislation authorizing special visas for those who could help alleviate the shortage and allow the IT industry to grow.

E-commerce plays the predominant role in the future of IT. Issues around the subject of digital signatures and other topics of doing business over the internet has had special focus from the IT industry and from ITAA.

Last in this un-exclusive list, ITAA pays special attention to government IT procurement issues and regulation. Such issues as Y2K, warranty clauses, and accessibility have brought us together to look at the interests of the industry regarding these opportunities.

So we have arrived at the topic of accessibility. Let’s look at this in general terms first. What’s the issue? The issue is that many of us don’t have access to the emerging vehicle for doing business in our society. One out of 5 of us has a disability. One out of three of us has someone we care for who is disabled.

Let’s test this. Everyone who can, stand up. C’mon, it’s time you took a stand! Now, those who have a disability that significantly impacts your ability to perform some life task, sit down.

I see about one in 5 are seated

Now, sit down if your spouse has a disability. Sit down if either of your parents has a disability. Sit down if your child or sister or brother or in-law has a disability.

I see that about a third of you are seated. So my point is that one out of three of us has someone we love with a disability. My point is that many of us, whether we are in government, academia, or in the IT industry itself, have some "skin" in this game. My point is the rest of you can sit down now.

So it’s not surprising that the industry supports the notion of accessibility of IT.

In fact, the IT industry commends the Access Board for the long, difficult job of getting the standards out, and we commend the FAR council for its job in producing first FAR addressing accessibility.

Business is moving many of its functions to the web. You can buy books, order flowers, buy and take delivery of software. You can check the schedule of a delayed flight or see what’s playing at the theater down the street.

So much of our private lives are moving to virtuality too. You can find the phone number of your old band teacher or send email to your son.

But without access to the technology, people with disabilities will be missing out on more and more of the economy, and more and more of life.

Unless…

Unless the promise of technology is steered toward including those who can’t see well, or can’t hear well, or can’t move well. The promise of faster processors mean that speech recognition can now parse continuous, real time speech. When you dial 1-800 information, it can understand what party you want the number for. The latest speech recognition software now really works, it’s not a toy anymore.

So that old "if we can put a man on the moon, surely I should be able to…" fill in your own dream here. Surf the net? Send email? Type the three finger salute, control – alt – delete?

The congress has decided that the tremendous buying power of the federal government will effect this change for us. They have decreed that the IT purchases of the federal government will do this "steering." A thirty seven billion dollar market will shift the nature of the products for not only the government, but for the whole marketplace. The spending of that thirty seven billion will be steered toward products that provide access. There is every expectation that this will drive the accessibility features into products which are sold in the larger general marketplace.

However, both industry and the agencies share a worry. They and we are concerned that there will be an interruption of the flow of products into the government market. Such interruption has happened in the past. If you remember the Y2K era. Many agencies completed their preparation for the change of the century, then tried to keep their systems unmodified for a 3 month period leading up to the new year. Software sales fell significantly. We need to make sure that all the issues that will impact the government market regarding the implementation of this new law cause as few undue interruptions as we can.

So here’s the big picture. We have a law. The law specifies that there will be new requirements when the government buys IT. It also specifies how these requirements will be defined.

First, it says that the Access Board will use the regulatory process to establish the performance and technical requirements for products that the government will buy. We’ve been there, done that.

Next, the FAR Council will define how the acquisition process will be changed to incentivize the buying of products that have more accessibility features. This august body has recently finished their job on this.

508 also mandates GSA to educate the procurement and assist with the implementation. GSA has in response gone to the procurement community with a series of seminars. Representative from the Access Board, from the DOJ, someone intimately familiar with the FAR, and an industry representative have participated in raising the awareness of procurement officials around the country.

GSA also sponsored the Accessibility Forum. This is a "facilitated standards activity." It’s a contract with ADL to organize a program through a program management company, ATI, and a consulting company, ERIM to stimulate the process of making standards applicable to the accessibility issues.

GSA had also planned on contracting a demonstration facility to show off the latest in assistive technology and accessible products, but that’s been put on the back burner for now.

So GSA is in the midst of carrying out their mandate.

The department of justice caught the job of reporting on how things are progressing. They bench-marked the state of accessibility last year, then will periodically report on changes in the conditions. I hope agencies are making provisions to measure meaningful parameters, like how many complaints and suits they are the target of, and how much they are spending to make their purchases accessible. But there I go again, hoping for logic.

By the way, DOJ will also be defending the agencies from civil actions from aggrieved people with disabilities who choose to take Uncle Sam to court.

That brings us to the teeth in this law. 508 gives employees with standing who have issues with IT acquisition that does not give them access to the information that others have, the chance to file complaints and to bring law suits. Basically, Uncle Sam is saying "so, sue me!" But many agencies are saying, "but only after following our formal complaint process." So you can expect to see many agencies cleaning up their complaint processes they already have in place, and making sure they can be applied to 508.

From industry’s perspective, there are a couple of points to note here. First, it’s the AGENCY that gets sued, not the provider of the IT product. At least not in the beginning. Second, the suit is not for damages, it’s for enforcement. It’s so the judge will say "yes, you DO have to provide equipment that is accessible, if there are no extenuating circumstances." That is certainly not to say that the agencies won’t take suits mighty seriously and try their darnedest to stay out of the sights of complainants.

So what has industry been up to?

Well, they certainly have played a role in this process. The Access Board convened a committee that included many companies that are here today, that played a big role in the Electronic and Information Technology Accessibility Advisory Committee, EITAAC, which compiled suggested rules for the Access Board to propose.

Industry then commented on the Access Board’s NPRM, the Notice of Proposed Rule Making which is what the proposed rules are called. ITAA and ITIC together are mentioned in the preamble to the final rule a total of 20 times. They provided extensive input on a variety of topics, many of which were considered and adopted in the final rule.

Industry also commented on the FAR.

Industry has been working with GSA on raising awareness of both the procurement community and of the IT industry members. ITAA has supplied a participant in each of the 10 or so seminars that has been held.

Industry is working closely with the IT Technical Assistance and Training Center, also know as the Georgia Tech grant, to express the needs of industry developers and management for training in accessibility topics.

And industry, under the leadership of ITIC, the IT Industries Council, is driving standards efforts in the Accessibility Forum (formerly known as ADIT). Industry has played a part in the NCITS V2 effort, which was heavily influenced by academia and the federal government in the beginning, though industry participation there has been growing of late, as I’m sure Bill LaPlant will point out later in HIS talk on V2.

There is a collaboration going on right now between the GSA and industry around a format which industry can use to express the accessibility features of their products. This will make it easier for procurement people to be able to compare the accessibility of products. ITIC is leading the industry forces, and ITAA is cooperating in developing the details of this format.

And many companies are beginning to see accessibility as a competitive edge. Consulting and enterprise services companies are starting 508 practices, (as are law firms), and almost every big IT company has a 508 program today where they had a Y2K program 2 years ago.

That brings us to the topic of what keeps industry awake at night? What issues does industry discuss in their smoke filled rooms? Are their rooms smoke filled any more?

Well, it’s basically 4 things.

First, it’s the standard,

then, it’s the FAR,

then it’s what GSA’s up to,

and last, it’s everything else.

It’s the standard, because we have a real issue with the limiting nature of design standards on the evolution of technology. We acknowledge the fact, however, that a consensus process, of a sort, was used to arrive at the total set.

It’s the FAR because we see the process to arrive at a check-the-box definition of compliance has the potential to shift liability for examining accessibility features to determine compliance from agencies to vendors.

It’s the FAR because industry feels that without a mechanism to temper the mandate to buy the most accessible product on the market, some wrong decisions will be made.

And it’s the FAR because it doesn’t position the notion of equivalent facilitation as a useful tool in the procurement toolbox.

Industry loses sleep trying to keep the definition of the standards from shifting under GSA’s actions to make life simpler for agencies.

Industry loses sleep worrying about the compromises required to make the details of reporting product accessibility data features agreeable to all.

And the IT industry lies awake trying to negotiate with the forces that can potentially deliver the needed training to developers to make accessible products.

That brings us to "everything else," it brings us to what we’ve never got time for. The "general" category includes the problem of multiple standards for accessibility, whether those standards come from other states, or from other countries.

But bottom line: industry lies awake worrying that there will be a hiccup in the purchasing process brought on by 508. Industry is committed to go anywhere, and to do anything, to see to it that the transition to accessible products proceeds as smoothly as possible.

But this talk revolves around industry’s concerns, so let’s look into these issues in some more depth.

First, the standard.

As ITAA’s 508 Working Group put together it’s comments on the access board’s NPRM a year ago, the main theme that ran through the whole set was how design standards limit innovation. For example, the web accessibility standards are focused on HTML. As technology evolves and the industry moves on from HTML, more and more, the standards will not be met. And there are some requirements that don’t make any sense in some contexts.

For example, I was helping a developer answer the question "how does the custom application you’re doing for us stack up against the 508 requirements?" The application used a "thin client", that means a regular old browser, in a PC to look at HTML info. This was a captive application, meaning the only "pages" that would be looked at were from the agency’s own server. The set of HTML that would be seen by the browser was well known. Any needed plug-ins had already been installed, there was absolutely no reason for a "link-to-plug-in" on each page, and indeed, there was not room for them. So even though it was not needed, the requirement for a link to the plug in could not be met.

Now industry understands consensus. In the recent meeting of the Accessibility Forum I saw an excellent way of explaining it, and I’ll read it as I remember it –

"I believe you understand my point of view,
I believe I understand your point of view.
This solution is not the best for me, but
I will support it."

These standards are not the best for any of the stake holders, but they represent a consensus and we will support them.

But, thank you lord, for "equivalent facilitation". Thanks for the note that say’s "If you can provide accessibility a different way, then you can consider your product compliant." But more about that in a minute, we’re not happy with that one yet.

That brings us to the FAR, doesn’t it?

There is a tug-of-war between the agencies and GSA on the one hand, that want a simple yes-no answer to the question, "is you product compliant, or not," and many vendors. The vendors protest, saying "I’ll tell you, point by point, what my product does in response to Access Board’s requirements. It’s up to the agency to determine whose product best meets them."

Industry is concerned that the due diligence required of the agency is too quickly pushed off to the vendor. If the question could be phrased "is your product compliant?" then the agency plays no role in determining that compliance. Whoever says "yes" to this question has assumed the liability of making that determination, and we’re not sure yet what that liability carries with it. Until the onerous penalties the government has for misleading them are tempered for doing business in marketplace, industry will be cautious when liability is concerned.

There’s also the issue that right now, every developer in every agency, and I purposely exaggerate here, is calling every vendor they ever heard of and asking about compliance. This sure echoes Y2K, doesn’t it?

There is progress being made here. GSA’s dialogue with industry on a preferred format for expressing accessibility product data is headed in the right direction. This should provide some relief for the bandwidth problem.

That brings us to yet another controversy, the notion of Best Value. The idea is that if there is no tempering of the requirement that an agency select the product that best meets the accessibility standards, there will possibly be some ridiculous product selections. There are several points of view on this. Some advocacy groups insist this will cut the heart out of 508. Other advocacy groups worry that a ridiculous product selection will move congress to compromise 508, and they have invested too much to have it changed now. I’m hopeful there can be some principles put down where compromise can be reached here.

The FAR did not address "equivalent facilitation." The FAR says,

quote,

"Unless an exception…applies, acquisitions of EIT supplies and services must meet the applicable accessibility standards at 36CFR part 1194." Unquote.

It’s possible to argue that "equivalent facilitation" is not a standard. It’s not in the same section as the rest of the standards. It’s possible to argue that "equivalent facilitation" is not an exception. It’s not in there with the rest of the exceptions. That fact that it’s not specifically referred to in the FAR has left it in limbo, and that’s not good. We need a clarification that clearly says that a requirement can be met using equivalent facilitation, and we need it now.

That brings us to things that have been put to bed, that we’re satisfied won’t limit industry’s capability to deliver accessibility into the IT product space. The first of those is a certification process that would lengthen the development cycle for products.

The process of specifying metrics for testing would threaten the Access Boards standards as they are defined now. By specifying metrics, the nature of the standard will be changed. The standards as they stand right now, have been reached through consensus. By changing them through specification of metrics starts that consensus process all over again.

And the issue of an onerous warranty didn’t show up in the FAR. It could have required jail sentences for clerical errors.

This brings us to the supporting activities, mostly being driven by GSA in collaboration with various other entities.

The Accessibility Forum met 2 weeks ago. Going into that meeting, there were 2 opposing views on how to best benefit the growth of accessible products. The dialogue between stakeholders from Government, industry, the assistive technology community, and the advocates for people with disabilities moved from their prospective sides of the table to a position of consensus. The debate metrics vs. more narrowly focused project on important issues like interoperability was had. There will be more flowing out of this body in the next year. Industry will be working to keep it focused and delivering value for building accessible products.

The Vendor data reporting we’ve talked about enough.

I do want to spend some time talking about the Georgia Tech Grant, or more properly the ITTATC or the IT Technical Assistance and Training Center, a department of education grant through NIDRR.

Industry’s issue with this is that it’s possibly a resource to use in getting Just In Time training for developers that will be delivering products in the near term.

But let’s back up a little. I think we all agree that the solution to the situation we’re in right now with a lack of accessibility in the IT product space is through education, but long term. Accessibility considerations should be driven into the technical education of developers, and into the business school curriculuum. And that’s the long term desire.

But short term, we need focus on 508 and 255, not a broad focus on accessiblity in general. We need to communicate to our developers what needs to be done to meet the requirements.

So we need training for the component parts of a company. Everyone needs to know about the law, but that’s not a long process. Many need to know about the FAR and the Standard. But only a few need to know the details of each section of the standard. And you probably have to take this training to the students where they are. You probably have to have it deliverable in differenct format. And industry needs this NOW.

So industry wants the goals of the ITTACT project to shift. And we’re willing to collaborate and negotiate to make it happen.

And that brings us to Everything Else. Let me take the last point first. Industry is concerned that other bodies like states and countries will arrive at standards for accessibility that differ from what we’ve got here. If that happens, and industry has to build not just one kind of accessiblity, but several, we will lose the economy of scale that comes with massive IT product scales. It’s imperative that we keep other accessiblity requirements from creeping into competition with 508. It’s to the interest of us all to see that the 508 requirements are the coin of more than just the federal realm.

And the bottom line?

We want the transition to accessiblity to be smooth.

It’s always a dangerous spot to be between a crowd and food, so I think I’ll stand aside, let you ask a few questions or throw vegetables, and then we’ll move to the break. Thanks for your attention, and I welcome your questions and comments.