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State agency outlines steps to meet federal web-accessibility rules before April 2026 deadline
Summary
At an internal workshop, the agency’s digital ADA coordinator walked staff through concrete fixes — from tagging PDFs and writing alt text to using Microsoft accessibility checkers — and set an April 24, 2026 compliance milestone for state and local government sites.
Unidentified Speaker (agency ADA coordinator for digital) told staff at a training that the agency is reworking all its websites to meet federal web-accessibility standards and urged employees to add simple checks to their workflow now to avoid problems when the new rules take effect.
"If the federal standards were to take into effect today, the majority of our errors would be our PDF documents," the unidentified presenter said, explaining that two frequent problems are image-based PDFs and missing alt text on graphics. The presenter said a vendor team will begin converting the first group of sites (Regence and Lewis) with a target go‑live in mid‑December.
The training framed the technical requirements through plain-language rules staff can use: descriptive hyperlinks instead of "click here," short paragraphs and headings for screen readers, alt text that includes contextual details (names, logos or visible text on an image), and keyboard operability. The presenter called out a minimum contrast ratio of 4.5:1 and recommended conservative color choices and larger fonts where possible.
The presenter also described a practical remediation strategy rather than an expectation of instant perfection. "A 100% compliance does not exist, will not exist," the presenter said, adding that enforcement typically focuses on documented effort and a compliance roadmap. The agency guide will allow staff to mark older materials as "archive" — exempting many pre‑2019 documents — while prioritizing newer files that must be remediated.
Staff questions covered social posts, dashboards and document workflows. The presenter advised uploading time‑coded VTT caption files for videos when available and checking YouTube’s auto‑captions for errors. On alt text, the presenter said context matters: an internal weekly newsletter can rely on recurring recognition of a campus logo, while an external social post should explicitly describe logos and any on‑image text.
Microsoft accessibility tools were presented as immediate "quick wins." Staff were shown where to run the Accessibility Checker in Word, PowerPoint and Excel, how to add off‑screen slide titles and correct reading order in PowerPoint, and how to export PDFs with accessibility tags from Microsoft apps or Acrobat. The presenter committed to follow up on Power BI dashboard guidance after consulting product specifics.
The agency will run periodic accessibility tests and maintain an internal compliance roadmap ahead of a statewide deadline the presenter identified as April 24, 2026. The presenter said the agency will share a step‑by‑step guide and training videos via SharePoint and the S drive and plans to hold more workshops early next year.
The training closed with a set of action items: staff should run the Microsoft accessibility checker on files before publishing, write descriptive hyperlinks and alt text, test keyboard navigation for their pages, and flag archived pre‑2019 materials. The presenter said the agency will prioritize remediation, reduce the active PDF inventory, and provide follow‑up resources and templates.
