- April 24, 2024
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Flagler County will pay $15,700 in a settlement agreement over an Americans with Disabilities Act lawsuit concerning its official website. The county government will also be required, over the course of a year, to take costly measures to adapt the website.
"We have to comply with the ADA, but in fact this is a scam," County Commissioner Greg Hansen said during a County Commission meeting Feb. 4. "This law firm is getting rich off the backs of Florida taxpayers."
"This can be done in a reasonable way, without everybody suing everybody else. ... We have always done everything we can to make sure disadvantaged people have access."
— DAVID SULLIVAN, county commissioner
Hansen said that the Miami-based law firm, the Law Offices of Scott R. Dinin, will receive the large majority of the settlement — $14,500 — while the plaintiff, Joel Price, will receive $1,200.
The suit is part of a spate of similar lawsuits filed against entities around the state.
"Mr. Price, his attorneys, and a small group of other individuals and attorneys have filed hundreds of similar lawsuits throughout the state against other counties, cities, school boards, other governmental entities, and private businesses," according to a summary of the suit in a county staff document.
Price, who is blind, "alleges that Flagler County's website, www.flaglercounty.org, is inaccessible to visually impaired individuals who use screen reader software, in violation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973," the staff document states.
The suit specifically addresses the PDF files on the website, which can't be read by the screen reader software used by individuals who are blind.
"Defendant has denied Plantiff Joel Price access to that electronic (PDF) document. As such, Defendant has denied access to Plaintiff based on Plaintiff's disability (being low sighted and/or blind)," the complaint of the lawsuit states. "In doing so, Defendant has denied Plaintiff his fundamental right to observe and participate in the democratic process of self-government."
The city of Flagler Beach is dealing with a similar lawsuit concerning the lack of closed captioning on its City Commission videos. It responded by briefly taking them offline.
Flagler County will not be removing material from the website, said Jarrod Shupe, the county's IT director.
"The biggest thing here is we’re not going to stop the process," he said. "We’re not going to stop putting stuff up on any of our websites. … We’re not going to change the way that it looks."
The county, Shupe said, will hire a new employee as a website accessibility coordinator, and will potentially add additional staff members. It will likely also have a third party consultant review the website annually to make sure it remains compliant.
"This in no way indicates that we are not trying to do what we can for disadvantaged people," County Commissioner David Sullivan said. But, he added, "This can be done in a reasonable way, without everybody suing everybody else. ... We have always done everything we can to make sure disadvantaged people have access."
County Attorney Al Hadeed said the Department of Justice — the rulemaking agency for the ADA — had promulgated draft regulations about local governments' responsibilities under the ADA, but has since withdrawn them, "which leaves local governments in a bit of a void," with most trying to adopt more current standards to support accessibility.
The proposed settlement for Flagler County, Hadeed said, "is in line with what other governments are doing in terms of resolving these suits."
The County Commission approved it unanimously.
