Press Room
Celebrating 20 Years of the ADA
July 26, 2010
Twenty years ago today, the Americans with Disabilities Act was signed into law. Title IV of the ADA specifically addressed telecommunications and required that all companies in the U.S. strive to provide accessible functionally equivalent services. This led to the creation of relay services, and then to VRS providers like Snap!VRS providing a real-time video solution that met the needs of deaf and hard of hearing people across the country.
Snap!VRS is pleased to mark the occasion as well as how far the deaf and hard of hearing community has progressed in its ability to advocate for access to mainstream American society. We have come from the invention and installation of TTYs and occasionally captioned TV shows to being able to anticipate developments that meet our needs, like videomail that acts as the equivalent of voicemail and lobbying for captioning of online content.
When President Bush signed the Act into law, he was quoted as saying, "Let the shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling down." Those of us in the deaf and hard of hearing community and the people we live and work with know well that the wall remains to some extent, but boy, those have been some big bricks we knocked out. Snap!VRS looks forward to providing continued and improved telecommunications access and partnering with our customers in the ongoing effort toward functional equivalency.
Happy Anniversary, ADA.
