COAT Petition Signatures

We, the undersigned, support the legislative and regulatory proposals of the Coalition of Organizations for Accessible Technology (COAT) to ensure full access by people with disabilities to evolving high speed broadband, wireless, and Internet communication and electronic technologies.

Over the last 20 years, various federal laws to ensure access to telephone and television technologies have been enacted. However, these federal laws have not kept pace with new technologies. For example, television programs distributed over the Internet are not required to have closed captions or video description – even if they had captions and description when they were shown on television. Also, although televisions with screens larger than 13 inches must display closed captions, small televisions, cell phones, PDAs, and other mobile devices do not have this same requirement; nor are they required to pass through video description. In addition, although federal law requires phones over the regular public telephone network to be hearing aid compatible, it is not clear whether this obligation carries over to smart phones used for communication over the Internet. Nor are there any affordable phone devices that work for people who are deaf-blind. The list goes on and on – nearly every time new technology is introduced in the marketplace, people with disabilities get left behind! We say enough is enough!

We want access. We need change. We support COAT’s efforts to enact the Twenty-first Century Telecommunications and Video Accessibility Act and other laws and policies that will ensure our equality to telecommunications, the Internet, and television programming!

Add your signature today!