36 CFR Part 1194 - Proposed Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Standards and Guidelines NPRM - Preamble

E205 Content (Section-by-Section Analysis)

This is an introductory section.

E205.1 General (Section-by-Section Analysis)

This section proposes that public-facing content, along with eight specific categories of non-public facing content, must conform to proposed E205. In turn, proposed E205 requires conformance to the Level A and Level AA Success Criteria and Conformance Requirements specified for Web pages in WCAG 2.0 or ISO 14289-1 (PDF/UA-1), both of which are incorporated by reference in 508 Chapter 1 and 255 Chapter 1. An exception is provided for non-public facing records maintained by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) under federal recordkeeping statutes. These proposed requirements and related exception are also discussed in Section IV.E.1 (Rulemaking History –2010 and 2011 ANPRMs: Significant Issues – Evolving Approaches to Covered Electronic Content), and Section V.A (Major Issues – Electronic Content).

Some file formats, it should be noted, do not directly support accessibility. For example, the JPEG compression standard for digital images does not facilitate embedded text description (commonly referred to as “alt tags”), and the MPEG-4 compression standard for audio and video digital data does not support closed captioning. Conformance may nonetheless be achieved through a variety of techniques, including providing requisite accessibility through the manner in which the inaccessible file is delivered or publicly posted. For example, JPEG photos posted to a website can be associated with descriptive identification using HTML. Photos attached to an email could have the text alternative provided in the body of the email. Similarly, there are commonly available methods for displaying caption text so that it is synchronized with MPEG-4 multimedia.

E205.2 Public Facing (Section-by-Section Analysis)

This section proposes that all public-facing content must meet the accessibility requirements in E205.4, which, in turn, requires conformance to WCAG 2.0 Level A and Level AA Success Criteria and Conformance Requirements specified for Web pages or, where applicable, ISO 14289-1 (PDF/UA-1). Public-facing content subject to this provision would include, for example: agency websites; electronic documents, images or video posted on agency websites; and agency social media sites or postings. Content regardless of form or format—including draft electronic documents—would be covered under this proposed section when public facing. Central to the analysis of whether an electronic document should be considered public facing is the identity of the party making the electronic content available to the public. If a federal agency posts an electronic document on its own website, third-party social media site, or other electronic public forum, that document—whether authored by the agency or a third party —is public facing and must comply with E205.2. Coverage of this broad category of agency-sponsored content is important because the Rehabilitation Act mandates that persons with disabilities—both those employed by the federal government and members of the public—have comparable access to, and use of, electronic information and data relative to persons without disabilities.

Question 14. Is the scope of public facing content covered by proposed E205.2 sufficiently clear? Are there other issues the Board should consider in defining the scope of the term “public facing”?

E205.3 Agency Official Communication (Section-by-Section Analysis)

This section proposes that an agency’s non-public facing content be required to meet the accessibility requirements in E205.4 (i.e., WCAG 2.0 Level A and Level AA Success Criteria or PDF/UA-1) when such content (a) constitutes agency official business, and (b) falls within one or more of eight categories of communication. The eight proposed categories are: (1) emergency notifications; (2) initial or final decisions adjudicating administrative claims or proceedings; (3) internal or external program or policy announcements; (4) notices of benefits, program eligibility, employment opportunities or personnel actions; (5) formal acknowledgements or receipts; (6) questionnaires or surveys; (7) templates or forms; and (8) educational or training materials.

While there is no express exception for draft content in E205.3, the Board expects that drafts, by their very nature, would typically fall outside the scope of agency official communications covered by this section. Generally speaking, only final documents and other electronic materials that are ready for dissemination to their intended audience would qualify as the type of content covered by categories 1 through 8. Draft content would, however, fall within the ambit of proposed E205.3 (and, therefore, be required to conform to WCAG 2.0 or PDF/UA-1) when an agency intends a draft to be “final” in the sense that it is being formally disseminated or published for input or comment by its intended audience. For example, if any agency task force is seeking to improve agency-wide telecommuting policies and circulates a draft policy memorandum by email to the office of human resources for review, neither the email nor draft memorandum would be covered under proposed E205.3. However, if instead, the agency task force had completed its draft policy on telecommuting and circulated the draft policy as an email attachment sent to all agency employees soliciting their input and comments, then both the email and attached draft policy memorandum—regardless of format (e.g., word processing document, PDF)—would be covered by this section and, accordingly, need to satisfy the accessibility requirements in E205.4.

Proposed E205.3 also provides an exception for non-public facing content maintained by NARA for archival purposes even if such content otherwise falls into one of the foregoing eight categories. Such electronic records would not need to conform to the accessibility requirements in proposed E205.4 so long as they remained non-public facing. The Board intends the scope of this exception to be limited, and anticipates that it will extend only to non-public facing electronic materials administered or maintained by NARA in compliance with federal recordkeeping statutes and implementing regulations.