From the Boston Globe:

Gov. Deval Patrick and other officials gathered disability advocates in the Massachusetts State House yesterday to highlight a series of improvements that will make the building accessible to all citizens.

The changes, with an estimated pricetag of tens of thousands of dollars, were spurred by a 2005 lawsuit alleging that the State House did not comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. The lawsuit was settled last year when the state pledged to make improvements.

Among the improvements made over the course of the past year are new power door lifts, closed-captioning for webcasts of legislative debates, and signlanguage interpreters available when requested for any proceedings. At the press conference, officials demonstrated screens that can be placed in meeting rooms and that can display the text of a speaker’s words in real-time.

… “American democracy only works when all have an opportunity to participate,” Patrick said. “And that has to as a practical matter include the ability to get access to this building physically and to the business of this building through communication.”

(Globe photo: Carl Richardson, coordinator of disability access for the Bureau of State Office Buildings, unveils changes.)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 30th, 2008 at 12:05 pm and is filed under ADA, accessibility, advocacy, law, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.