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Committee hears bill to curb 'sue-and-settle' ADA website lawsuits; small businesses urge swift passage
Summary
Representative Sherry Gallick told the Commerce Committee House Bill 18-42 would give courts tools to identify and sanction abusive ADA website lawsuits while preserving legitimate ADA enforcement. Multiple small-business owners and chambers testified in support, describing demand letters, 14-day settlement deadlines and large remediation costs.
Representative Sherry Gallick introduced House Bill 18-42 to curb what she described as abusive "sue-and-settle" ADA website accessibility litigation while preserving the rights of individuals with disabilities to seek compliance. Gallick told the Commerce Committee the bill would create objective factors courts could use to identify serial, predatory suits — for example, repeated filings by the same counsel, failure to give notice and opportunities to cure, or the use of nondisclosure provisions in settlements — and would allow courts to award fees and costs back to businesses when litigation is found abusive.
"This bill keeps the courthouse open for legitimate claims while discouraging litigation that does nothing to improve accessibility," Gallick said. She cited spike years of website ADA filings nationally and said Missouri ranked among the top states for such filings in recent years.
Small-business owners from across Missouri described receiving demand letters that gave them as few as 14 days to respond and sometimes demanded settlement amounts that small companies could not absorb. Beth Snyder, an e-commerce owner, said a website audit reported thousands of supposed violations and that available remediation software and services can cost upward of $30,000 — a prohibitive amount for many small operations. "I'm not trying to avoid accessibility," she said, "but the current process feels like a shakedown."
Multiple business groups and local chambers — including NFIB, the Missouri Chamber, and local chamber executives — registered support and described direct member impacts. Testimony also included organizations representing employment for people with disabilities emphasizing support for ADA compliance while distinguishing legitimate enforcement from serial litigious practices.
The committee recorded broad, bipartisan support for the measure from business witnesses and asked procedural questions about coordination with federal ADA enforcement. No formal vote occurred during this session; the bill remains in committee for further action.
