Results for

  • Online Accessibility Act

    HR #8478 | Last Action: 10/1/2020
    Online Accessibility Act This bill sets forth requirements for consumer-facing websites and mobile applications owned or operated by a private entity and guidance regarding standards for website accessibility by the disabled. Specifically, the bill prohibits the exclusion of an individual, by reason of disability, from participation in or being denied the full and equal benefits of the services of such a website or application or from being subjected to discrimination by a private owner or operator of such a website or application. Such a website or application shall be considered compliant if it is in substantial compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 Level A and Level AA standard established by the Accessibility Guidelines Working Group. A noncompliant entity shall provide an alternative, equivalent means of access by individuals with disabilities. The Access Board must publish related standards. The bill sets forth provisions regarding administrative remedies and reporting of violations and enforcement by the Department of Justice and through private rights of action.
  • Air Carrier Access Amendments Act of 2019

    S #669 | Last Action: 3/6/2019
    Air Carrier Access Amendments Act of 2019 This bill expands provisions prohibiting discrimination against disabled individuals by an air carrier. Specifically, it enumerates certain actions that an air carrier must take or may not take with respect to a disabled individual. It also requires the Department of Transportation (DOT) to ensure that disabled individuals traveling in air transportation are able to file complaints with DOT in response to disability-related discrimination and receive assistance from DOT through a hotline or comparable electronic means. The bill authorizes an aggrieved individual and the Department of Justice to bring a civil action for discrimination. The Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board shall prescribe regulations setting forth minimum standards for aircraft with new or existing type certificates to ensure the accessibility of individuals with disabilities, including those who use wheelchairs. The standards shall address, among other things, boarding and deplaning equipment, seatng accommodations, lavatories, visually accessible announcements, and proper stowage of assistive devices in the cargo hold to prevent damage.
  • Air Carrier Access Amendments Act of 2019

    HR #1549 | Last Action: 3/7/2019
    Air Carrier Access Amendments Act of 2019 This bill expands provisions prohibiting discrimination against disabled individuals by an air carrier. Specifically, it enumerates certain actions that an air carrier must take or may not take with respect to a disabled individual. It also requires the Department of Transportation (DOT) to ensure that disabled individuals traveling in air transportation are able to file complaints with DOT in response to disability-related discrimination and receive assistance from DOT through a hotline or comparable electronic means. The bill authorizes an aggrieved individual and the Department of Justice to bring a civil action for discrimination. The Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board shall prescribe regulations setting forth minimum standards for aircraft with new or existing type certificates to ensure the accessibility of individuals with disabilities, including those who use wheelchairs. The standards shall address, among other things, boarding and deplaning equipment, seating accommodations, lavatories, visually accessible announcements, and proper stowage of assistive devices in the cargo hold to prevent damage.
  • Expanding Access to Lending Options Act

    S #3389 | Last Action: 3/4/2020
    Expanding Access to Lending Options Act This bill allows the National Credit Union Administration Board to increase the federal credit union loan maturity cap from 15 to 20 years.
  • Accessible Voting Act of 2020

    S #3206 | Last Action: 1/16/2020
    Accessible Voting Act of 2020 This bill increases voting accessibility for individuals with disabilities and older individuals, including by establishing an office of accessibility within the Election Assistance Commission, requiring states to expand access to absentee registration procedures and no-excuse mail-in absentee voting in federal elections, and permanently reauthorizing and expanding a grant program for increasing accessibility to polling places.
  • Accessible Voting Act of 2020

    HR #7755 | Last Action: 7/23/2020
    Accessible Voting Act of 2020 This bill increases voting accessibility for individuals with disabilities and older individuals, including by establishing an office of accessibility within the Election Assistance Commission, requiring states to expand access to absentee registration procedures and no-excuse mail-in absentee voting in federal elections, and permanently reauthorizing and expanding a grant program for increasing accessibility to polling places.
  • Airline Information and Entertainment Access Act

    S #3473 | Last Action: 3/12/2020
    Airline Information and Entertainment Access Act This bill requires air carriers (including foreign carriers) to ensure equal access to airline information and entertainment programming for all airline passengers regardless of their disabilities. Specifically, the bill requires * open captioning and an American Sign Language option for persons with disabilities when the information and programming are available to passengers through shared video displays, such as a monitor located in a passenger access aisle; * closed captioning and an American Sign Language option when the information and programming are available to passengers through individual video displays; * video descriptions when the information and programming are available to passengers through individual video displays or shared video displays; * an aural public address announcement in textual format through individual video displays or shared video displays; and * control systems for video displays to have a nonvisual operating option. A civil action may be brought in a U.S. District Court against an air carrier for violations of these requirements. The Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board must set forth the minimum technical criteria for individual video displays to ensure that they include a mechanism that allows persons with disabilities to operate the displays nonvisually.
  • American Job Centers Family Accessibility Act of 2020

    HR #6069 | Last Action: 3/3/2020
    American Job Centers Family Accessibility Act of 2020 This bill establishes a competitive grant program for states to provide access to childcare for individuals receiving services from specified workforce training and career programs.
  • Healthy Food Access for All Americans Act

    S #786 | Last Action: 3/13/2019
    Healthy Food Access for All Americans Act This bill allows tax credits and grants for activities that provide access to healthy food in food deserts, which are communities that have limited or no access to grocery stores and meet income requirements. For entities that are certified by the Department of the Treasury as special access food providers using specified criteria, the bill allows tax credits for operating a new grocery store or renovating an existing grocery store in a food desert. The bill also authorizes grants for a portion of (1) the construction costs of building a permanent food bank in a food desert, and (2) the annual operating costs of temporary access merchants (mobile markets, farmers markets, and food banks). Treasury, in coordination with the Department of Agriculture (USDA), must annually allocate the tax credits and grants to special access food providers. Grants authorized by this bill are not considered gross income for tax purposes. The bill also requires USDA to update the Food Access Research Atlas at least annually to account for food retailers that are placed in service during that year.
  • Healthy Food Access for All Americans Act

    HR #1717 | Last Action: 3/13/2019
    Healthy Food Access for All Americans Act This bill allows tax credits and grants for activities that provide access to healthy food in food deserts, which are communities that have limited or no access to grocery stores and meet income requirements. For entities that are certified by the Department of the Treasury as special access food providers using specified criteria, the bill allows tax credits for operating a new grocery store or renovating an existing grocery store in a food desert. The bill also authorizes grants for a portion of (1) the construction costs of building a permanent food bank in a food desert, and (2) the annual operating costs of temporary access merchants (mobile markets, farmers markets, and food banks). Treasury, in coordination with the Department of Agriculture (USDA), must annually allocate the tax credits and grants to special access food providers. Grants authorized by this bill are not considered gross income for tax purposes. The bill also requires USDA to update the Food Access Research Atlas at least annually to account for food retailers that are placed in service during that year.
  • Promotion Accessibility Act

    HR #7798 | Last Action: 7/27/2020
    Promotion Accessibility Act This bill authorizes members of the Foreign Service or the Senior Foreign Service to submit a gap memo in advance of having their performance evaluated by a selection board, and it prohibits members of a selection board from considering such a submission as negative when evaluating a member's performance. A gap memo is a written record indicating and explaining a gap in the record of a member that is due to personal circumstances, including for health, family, or other reasons.
  • GAIN Act

    HR #3929 | Last Action: 7/24/2019
    Greater Access and Independence through Nonvisual Access Technology Act of 2019 or the GAIN Act This bill requires the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board (Access Board) to establish access standards for home (1) medical devices, (2) appliances, and (3) exercise equipment that allow blind consumers to effectively use such products.
  • Disability Access to Transportation Act

    HR #6248 | Last Action: 3/12/2020
    Disability Access to Transportation Act This bill expands transportation access for individuals with disabilities. Specifically, the bill requires the Department of Transportation to * establish a one-stop paratransit pilot program to develop or expand paratransit programs carried out pursuant to the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) to prevent long wait times between multiple trips that unduly limit an individual's ability to complete essential tasks; * issue regulations enforcing guidelines that set forth minimum standards for pedestrian facilities in the public right-of-way; * implement procedures that allow an individual to submit an ADA complaint by phone, by mail-in form, and online; * require each public transit provider and contractor providing paratransit services to post certain information for how an individual can file a disability-related complaint; * file yearly reports of accessibility complaints; and * create an accessibility data pilot program to assist states and metropolitan or rural planning organizations to improve their transportation planning.
  • Exercise and Fitness for All Act

    HR #4561 | Last Action: 9/27/2019
    Exercise and Fitness for All Act This bill requires the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board (Access Board) to develop guidelines for exercise or fitness service providers regarding the provision of accessible exercise or fitness equipment. The Access Board must subsequently promulgate regulations, consistent with the guidelines, requiring that exercise or fitness classes and instruction provided by fitness providers are accessible to people with disabilities. The regulations also must require that each provider make at least one employee available to assist people with disabilities with using the accessible exercise or fitness equipment.
  • Exercise and Fitness for All Act

    S #1244 | Last Action: 4/30/2019
    Exercise and Fitness for All Act This bill requires the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board (Access Board) to develop guidelines for exercise or fitness service providers regarding the provision of accessible exercise or fitness equipment, and extends the disabled access tax credit to providers that implement such guidelines. The Access Board must subsequently promulgate regulations, consistent with the guidelines, requiring that exercise or fitness classes and instruction provided by fitness providers are accessible to people with disabilities. The regulations also must require that each provider make at least one employee available to assist people with disabilities with using the accessible exercise or fitness equipment.
  • Department of Energy National Labs Jobs ACCESS Act

    S #1739 | Last Action: 11/19/2019
    Department of Energy National Labs Jobs ACCESS Act This bill establishes the Department of Energy National Lab Jobs ACCESS Program to provide grants for technical, skills-based preapprenticeship and apprenticeship programs that provide employer-driven or recognized postsecondary credentials during the five-year grant period.
  • Department of Energy National Labs Jobs ACCESS Act

    HR #3135 | Last Action: 6/5/2019
    Department of Energy National Labs Jobs ACCESS Act This bill establishes the Department of Energy National Lab Jobs ACCESS Program to provide grants for technical, skills-based preapprenticeship and apprenticeship programs that provide employer-driven or recognized postsecondary credentials during the five-year grant period.
  • ACCESS Act

    HR #4099 | Last Action: 7/30/2019
    ADA Compliance for Customer Entry to Stores and Services Act or the ACCESS Act This bill addresses access to public accommodations for persons with a disability. The bill requires the Department of Justice (DOJ) to develop a program to educate state and local governments and property owners on strategies for promoting access to public accommodations for persons with a disability. The bill authorizes an aggrieved person, after taking specified actions, to commence a civil action based on the failure to remove an architectural barrier to access an existing public accommodation. Specifically, the aggrieved person must have provided the owners or operators a written notice specific enough to identify the barrier and specify the circumstances under which public accommodation access was denied. The owners or operators must have (1) failed to provide the person a written description outlining improvements that will be made to improve the barrier, or (2) failed to remove the barrier or make substantial progress after providing such a description. The Judicial Conference of the United States must develop a model program to promote alternative dispute resolution mechanisms to resolve claims involving architectural barriers to access for public accommodations. Finally, the bill requires DOJ to complete a study of whether certain web content standards or information services for individuals with disabilities provided telephonically provide the same accommodations as would be available on a website.
  • Access to Emergency Credit Facilities Act of 2020

    S #4586 | Last Action: 9/16/2020
    Access to Emergency Credit Facilities Act of 2020 This bill provides for the treatment under existing COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019) economic aid programs of nationally recognized statistical rating organizations, retroactive to March 15, 2020. Specifically, the bill prohibits the requirement of a credit rating from a specific organization to qualify for these aid programs. Furthermore, a credit rating from an organization approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission must be accepted to qualify for these aid programs. Additionally, the Government Accountability Office must report on the quality of credit ratings issued by these organizations, their effect on access to capital markets, and the implementation of this bill.
  • Improving Access to Jobs Act

    HR #6464 | Last Action: 4/7/2020
    Improving Access to Jobs Act This bill requires transportation planners to consider projects and strategies to improve safe and convenient access to employment. (Accessis the ability to travel by auto, transit, pedestrian, and bike networks measured in terms of travel times, with impedances for level of travel stress for active travel and costs for low income travelers.) The Department of Transportation must establish minimum standards for states to use in determining and improving safe and convenient access to employment for all users by all modes of travel. If a state fails to improve access, it must obligate 10% of federal transportation funds apportioned to such state from the previous fiscal year into its efforts to meet the minimum standards to improve access. The bill prohibits metropolitan transportation planning organizations from approving a transportation improvement plan that increases the ratio of automobile to non-automobile access in urbanized areas.
  • Improving Access to Services Act

    HR #6463 | Last Action: 4/7/2020
    Improving Access to Services Act This bill requires transportation planners to consider projects and strategies to improve safe and convenient access to certain services, including health care facilities, child care, and affordable housing. (Accessis the ability to travel by auto, transit, pedestrian, and bike networks measured in terms of travel times, with impedances for level of travel stress for active travel and costs for low income travelers.) The Department of Transportation must establish minimum standards for states to use in determining and improving safe and convenient access to certain services for all users by all modes of travel. If a state fails to improve access, it must obligate 10% of federal transportation funds apportioned to such state from the previous fiscal year into its efforts to meet the minimum standards to improve access. The bill prohibits metropolitan transportation planning organizations from approving a transportation improvement plan that increases the ratio of automobile to non-automobile access in urbanized areas.
  • ACCESS Act

    HR #1326 | Last Action: 3/26/2019
    Authorizing Critical Conservation and Enabling Sportsmen and Sportswomen Act or the ACCESS Act This bill reauthorizes, authorizes, and establishes entities and activities for the conservation of fish and wildlife and opportunities for hunting and recreational shooting. The bill * authorizes the U.S. Geological Survey to conduct critical monitoring, scientific assessments, and research in support of the binational fisheries within the Great Lakes Basin between the United States and Canada, * facilitates the construction and expansion of public target ranges, and * requires the Departments of Agriculture and of the Interior to establish a fee schedule for commercial filming and still photography operations on federal land. The bill reauthorizes through FY2024 the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and the Chesapeake Bay Program and the Chesapeake Bay Initiative. The bill establishes the National Fish Habitat Board and the Wildlife and Hunting Heritage Conservation Council Advisory Committee on wildlife and habitat conservation, hunting, and recreational shooting. The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service-Wildlife Services shall * allocate funds to support states and tribes in their efforts to implement management strategies to address chronic wasting disease, and * make grants to support the expansion and acceleration of applied research on such disease. The bill requires a National Academy of Sciences study on the transmission of chronic wasting disease in any species within the family Cervidae (the deer family) in the United States.
  • ACCESS BROADBAND Act

    HR #1328 | Last Action: 5/8/2019
    Advancing Critical Connectivity Expands Service, Small Business Resources, Opportunities, Access, and Data Based on Assessed Need and Demand Act or the ACCESS BROADBAND Act This bill requires the Department of Commerce to establish the Office of Internet Connectivity and Growth within the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. The office shall connect with communities that need access to high-speed internet and hold regional workshops to share best practices and effective strategies for promoting broadband access and adoption. The bill also requires the office to (1) develop targeted broadband training and presentations for various demographic communities through media, (2) develop and distribute publications providing guidance to communities for expanding broadband access and adoption, and (3) track construction and use of and access to any broadband infrastructure built using federal support. Under the bill, the office shall consult with any agency offering a federal broadband support program in order to streamline the application process for financial assistance or grants. The office, any agency that offers a federal broadband support program, and the Federal Communications Commission through the Universal Service Fund shall coordinate to ensure that broadband support is being distributed in an efficient, technology-neutral, and financially sustainable manner.
  • ACCESS BROADBAND Act

    S #1046 | Last Action: 3/11/2020
    Advancing Critical Connectivity Expands Service, Small Business Resources, Opportunities, Access, and Data Based on Assessed Need and Demand Act or the ACCESS BROADBAND Act This bill requires the Department of Commerce to establish the Office of Internet Connectivity and Growth within the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). The office shall connect with communities that need access to high-speed internet and hold regional workshops to share best practices and effective strategies for promoting broadband access and adoption. The bill also requires the office to (1) develop targeted broadband training and presentations for various demographic communities through media; (2) develop and distribute publications providing guidance to communities for expanding broadband access and adoption; and (3) cooperate with state agencies that provide similar investments, outreach, and coordination through federal programs. The NTIA shall assign its similar activities to the office, and the office shall consult with any agency offering a federal broadband support program in order to streamline the application process for financial assistance or grants.
  • Jury ACCESS Act

    S #250 | Last Action: 1/29/2019
    Jury Access for Capable Citizens and Equality in Service Selection Act of 2019 or the Jury ACCESS Act This bill prohibits the exclusion of individuals from jury service on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity.