How Does HR 3101 Affect Federal Agencies?

Caption Action 2 had been wondering how HR 3101 applies to the Federal government. On YouTube there is a U.S. Government channel: http://www.youtube.com/usgovernment. Many if not most of the videos on that channel are not captioned. There is a button labeled "Accessible Video Library," but the videos in that library are just a fraction of what is available on the U.S. Government YouTube channel.

The main U.S. Government channel has a lengthy list of Federal agencies with video content. Ironically, the U.S. Department of Education does not have captions on its YouTube videos. This is the Department of Education, folks! Of all agencies that should be captioning online, it should be the Department of Education!!

So Caption Action 2 contacted Rosaline Crawford, the Director, Law and Advocacy Center for the National Association of the Deaf. We asked Crawford, "How does HR 3101 apply to the Federal government?" especially with regard to the YouTube U.S. Government Channel. Crawford responded that was a good question to ask.

According to Crawford, when the government has a YouTube channel, it makes them start to look like an entity (similar to ABC, NBC, CNN) that would be covered by the Communications Act. At the same time, Crawford pointed out that HR 3101 is not needed for the Federal government. There is already a law, Section 508, that requires the Federal government to make its electronic and information technology accessible! See http://www.section508.gov for more information. Crawford quoted one thing from Section508.gov: "The law applies to all Federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology." Another law that applies to the Federal government is Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, which requires effective communication with deaf and hard of hearing people.

"Communicating on the Internet does not excuse federal agencies from those long-standing obligations under Section 504," said Crawford.

Finally, Crawford said that when deaf and hard of hearing people see a Federal video that is not captioned, they should file a complaint under Section 504 and/or Section 508 with the Federal agency's office for civil rights.

What. A. Day. Caption Action 2 on Capitol Hill

Caption Action 2 (Jamie) had quite a day on Capitol Hill!

Learning More About HR 3101

Speakers and panel members educated a large crowd about HR 3101 the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2009. There is much more to the bill than just captioning, but Caption Action 2's focus is on the captioning aspect of the bill. However, we will be blogging about the other aspects too, because they are also of major importance to the deaf and hard of hearing, deaf-blind, and blind/visually impaired communities. Although he was tied up with health care legislation, Representative Markey came and received an award (another award went to Senator McCain for his longtime support for disability rights and access).

One speaker was David Bahar, a deaf legislative assistant in Congressman Jay Inslee's office. Unfortunately, Inslee has not yet become a co-sponsor for HR 3101. Bahar said that Inslee's office was still "studying" the bill. Hopefully Inslee will become a co-sponsor, but no guarantee.

Teams Visit Representative Offices

Eight teams then went to visit Representatives' offices. Each team had appointments to visit just three offices, so that was only 24 Representatives. A tiny sliver of all the Representatives on Capitol Hill! There are over 400 Representatives in the House.

Fred Weiner (TDI board member) led the team that Jamie was on. Fred did a good job of presenting about the bill to the staff members that the team met with. Another team member told how his young hearing children like to watch video online but he can not understand the videos. Fred and Jamie talked about their deaf children, and Jamie talked about Caption Action 2. One staff member was especially helpful; he was a subject matter expert on telecommunications, and he warned the team that the wireless industry was not that supportive of the bill (more in another blog post once Jamie clarifies the issues that the wireless industry has with the bill).

When the staff member told the team that the wireless industry wants to be "included" on the discussion, a team member responded by complaining that it goes two ways: if the wireless industry wants to be included, they have to include us in new technology development!! Jamie chimed in, "Bottom line...we are tired of playing catch up!"

Continuing to Lobby

Jamie stayed afterwards to do some more lobbying on her own. She visited at least 90 Representatives' offices before she had to call it quits by 5 p.m. due to aching feet. Jamie developed a new respect for what lobbyists do!

At each Representative's office, Jamie gave an "elevator pitch," a short, three-minute pitch about the bill. Jamie's pitch: Hello, I am here about HR 3101, the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2009. This bill takes the laws for captioning on television and applies them to the world wide web. On Facebook, I run this group that supports the bill and (Jamie hands over printout of Caption Action 2 on Facebook) that is growing by 1,000 people every three days." Several staff members exclaimed "Wow!" when they heard how quickly the group is growing.

Meeting Representative Conyers

One of the Representatives' offices that Jamie visited was John Conyers, Jr. (MI). A staff member there was very enthusiastic about the bill because a relative is hard of hearing. That staff member actually arranged for Jamie to meet Conyers in person! Conyers even read the bill while Jamie waited. Then a photographer took their picture together. Here's hoping Conyers becomes a co-sponsor of the bill.

Rep. Stark Signs on as Co-Sponsor!

Today Caption Action 2 learned that Representative Fortney Pete Stark (CA) has signed on as the fourth confirmed co-sponsor. Another representative, Edolphus Towns (NY) is reportedly interested, but we received confirmation from Capitol Hill that Towns has not committed yet. If you live in New York's 10th District, send email to Towns urging him to commit as a co-sponsor!

The 10th District covers Brooklyn - Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Heights, Brownsville, Canarsie, East New York and Ocean Hill, and part of Fort Greene and Williamsburg.