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Granite Town Media flags WCAG/ADA compliance and high closed-captioning costs
Summary
Director Chris Gentry told the board the town must meet WCAG 2.1 AA web standards and that closed-captioning costs for broadcasts could total roughly $150,000 per year under current options; staff are assembling technical guidelines and seeking state IT guidance.
Granite Town Media’s director, Chris Gentry, briefed the board on new web-accessibility obligations tied to WCAG standards and the town’s effort to comply with federal and state guidance. "The standards that we have to, go by is actually ... WCAG 2.1 in level AA," Gentry said, adding the guidance is available on ada.gov.
Gentry told members the town’s new website largely meets the standards but that PDFs and legacy documents remain the primary compliance gap. He described technical requirements — sans-serif fonts like Arial or Calibri, adequate color contrast, alt text for images and keyboard-only navigation — and said he is compiling a town-wide guideline so departments use consistent fonts and formatting.
Closed-captioning for live video emerged as a significant budget concern. Gentry said the town’s current vendor offers a subscription captioning option billed by minute and that a prior estimate for what the town would need was about $150,000. "It costs the last time we checked, it was approximately a $150,000 for what we currently do," he said.
Board members discussed exemption questions and implementation timing. Gentry noted several exemptions and grandfathering rules that can apply to archival content and third-party materials, and he said the state extended compliance timelines for jurisdictions under 50,000 population, moving Granite Town’s deadline to April 2027 for some requirements. "Our website, when we get the new website, actually brought us into the standard," he added, but he emphasized that PDFs and some imported files still need remediation.
Gentry said he has requested state IT assistance and will consult the town’s ADA compliance contact. He asked departments to standardize document creation and promised to return with final technical standards and a recommendation for next steps, including potential budget implications.
