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Americans with Disabilities Act Title II Web and Mobile Application Accessibility Rule

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Today many government entities offer a variety of services online through websites and mobile apps.  This can include ordering a dog license, watching a council meeting, or requesting a trash pickup.  While these online services are a convenience for both the government and its citizens, it is important that all citizens are able to use them.  

For example, if your website has images, is there “alt text” that can share the meaning of the image to people who are blind and use screen readers? 

How is the color contrast and text size on your website or app?

If you have video and audio recordings, do they have captions and/or transcripts?

To ensure that people with disabilities can access the services provided by state and local government websites and mobile apps, in April 2024 the U.S. Department of Justice published the Americans with Disabilities Act Title II Web and Mobile Application Accessibility Rule.  This rule specifies the technical requirements that state and local governments must follow for their websites and apps.  It also establishes timelines for complying with the requirements:

  • State or local governments with a population of 50,000 or more persons: Compliance deadline: April 24, 2026
  • State or local governments with a population of 0 to 49,999 persons: Compliance deadline: April 26, 2027

More information is available on the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) website https://www.ada.gov/resources/web-rule-first-steps/.  Also, watch the Ohio Electronic Records Committee’s blog for additional posts about the rule.     

Social Media and Live Broadcast Video Records

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Facebook announced an update regarding their Live Video storage policy three weeks ago. Beginning on February 19th, any new live broadcasts can be replayed, downloaded or shared from Facebook Pages or profiles for 30 days. After 30 days, these live broadcasts will automatically be removed from Facebook. Any archived live videos older than 30 days will be removed from Facebook after 90 days. Before the deletion of these videos, Facebook will notify you via email and through the Facebook app informing you that you will have 90 days to download or transfer your live broadcast videos.

To ensure that these live video broadcasts are preserved, you will have the opportunity to download the live broadcast videos to your device, transfer them to your cloud storage, or convert them to a new reel. Facebook provides directions on the various ways to do these procedures. Updating Our Facebook Live Video Storage Policy | Meta

According to this announcement, Meta is making these changes to align with their storage policies with industry standards and to help ensure that Meta is providing the most up-to-date live video experiences for all on Facebook.

This is a concern for several reasons:

1. Social media companies control how long these potential records will be available in a social media platform.

2. Potential government agencies that use Facebook Live video broadcasts (especially during the pandemic) could lose records of the office unless they start downloading the videos now. This could result in more electronic records needing to be stored on government servers, which will increase storage space/cost money to preserve.

If you are an entity that uses Facebook live video broadcasts and has a social media archiving software program, i.e., – ArchiveSocial, research if these live broadcasts are being captured and preserved permanently. If you do not have an archiving social media software program that preserves these records, begin a plan on how your entity will start preserving these records incrementally.

Yes, Email Can Be an Official Record

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As the State of Ohio begins its 136th General Assembly of the Ohio Legislature, the Ohio Electronic Records Committee would like to remind newly elected State Legislators of our Email Management Online Training Series. Training courses include Email As A Record; Email Clean-Up Strategies; Email Filing and Organization; and Microsoft 365 Outlook Email Management.

In these online courses, one will learn several things including, that “email itself is not a record series but should be retained based on the content of the message.” If the email serves as a record that “documents the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, operations, or other activities of the office,” [ORC 149.011(G)] then it needs to be retained. Examples of records in email format can include: correspondence, personnel documentation, or project working papers. Often emails have attached documents with them. This training series helps one determine what is necessary to keep (email, email and attachment, or just the attachment) for different circumstances.

The amount of email one receives can be quite overwhelming. The Email Clean-Up and Email Filing and Organization training courses are both helpful and informative and can guide one through this difficult process in an efficient manner. Lastly, many governmental bodies, organizations, and businesses are now switching to Microsoft 365 Outlook Email. Steps for applying retention rules for Microsoft 365 Outlook emails are demonstrated using desktop and web applications in the training program, Microsoft 365 Outlook Email Management.

Please take some time to review these very informative courses. Good luck as you begin your endeavor in email management.