SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND BLAIR COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

In order to assist the County to meet its obligations under the ADA, the Department has provided the County with information from the Department’s November 2012 reviews of the County’s polling place locations, including the violations found and recommendations for how to make each location temporarily accessible on Election Day, as applicable. 

The Department has also provided the County with its recommendations regarding polling place locations that the Department has determined, through its November 2012 surveys, are not accessible and cannot be made temporarily accessible on Election Day.  If a polling place location can only be made accessible through permanent remedies (through facility alterations), then the Department recommended that the polling place be relocated to an alternate, accessible location.  The County will select alternative locations for these polling place locations pursuant to Paragraphs 17 and 18 of this Agreement, and implement all new polling place locations by the November 2014 election.  Nothing in this Agreement prohibits the County from making ADA-compliant, permanent modifications to its polling place locations instead of providing temporary remedial measures.

Throughout the duration of this Agreement, the Department may conduct compliance surveys or reviews of the County’s polling places in each election or at any other time with reasonable notice.   

The Department will provide assistance to the County on devising and using a survey instrument that will assess whether a newly proposed polling place location is or can be made temporarily accessible on Election Day.  The survey instrument will include a requirement to include photographs and will also require the identification of appropriate remedial provisions, including the remedial provisions in Paragraph 13 of this Agreement.  The survey instrument will be submitted to the Department for review and approval within 21 days of the effective date of this Agreement.