COAT Position Statement: Ensure Access to Emergency Information and Services

COAT recommendation: Ensure that people with disabilities have equivalent access to emergency information and services through the identification of barriers and implementation of solutions in current and new technologies, including solutions for achieving access by people with disabilities to 9-1-1 emergency public safety answering points (PSAPs) through the receipt of text and video.

Who will benefit? There are over 30 million persons who are deaf and hard of hearing and several million persons with speech disabilities in the U.S., many of whom rely on text and/or video to communicate by phone. It is predicted that the baby boomers will substantially expand the number of people with hearing loss to 78 million by 2030. (Newsweek, 2005)

Current law: Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act, 42 U.S.C. §12131 et. seq., requires direct TTY access to PSAPs.[1] In addition, Section 225 of the Communications Act, 47 U.S.C. §225, as added by Title IV of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-336), requires common carriers to provide emergency access to Public Service Answering Points (PSAPs, or 9-1-1 services centers) via telecommunications relay services.

Why it is not enough: Although existing law requires direct TTY access to 9-1-1 services and indirect access via telecommunications relay services, new and more sophisticated text and video communication technologies, including pagers, instant messaging, and IP and video relay services, have dramatically reduced the use of TTYs by people with hearing and speech disabilities. As a consequence, individuals using these more modern technologies no longer have direct, or even indirect, access to emergency authorities. New legislative mandates are needed to ensure that the migration plan for the next generation IP-enabled emergency network fully addresses the needs of people with disabilities. To this end, any equipment grants distributed to PSAPs to upgrade their systems need to be conditioned on the provision of direct access to 9-1-1 from voice, text and video devices. Additionally, all relay providers need to receive the same protection from liability for 9-1-1 communications that currently exists for traditional wireline and wireless providers, and must be afforded nondiscriminatory access to appropriate PSAP facilities.

Technical and economic feasibility: The technical means by which a next generation 9-1-1 and emergency communications system will be capable of receiving and responding to text and video communications will be developed on a national scale over the next several years. The provision of this new system will facilitate access not only by people with disabilities, but by all members of the general population in emergency situations, who will also use these new forms of communication to receive assistance.

[1] The specific requirement for direct TTY access is contained at 28 C.F.R. §35.162