Ada Education and Reform Act of 2017

Floor Speech

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Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman of the committee for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Maryland just said that, after decades, the ADA was well understood and the law was easy to comply with. In many cases, that may be true, but technology has been advancing so quickly that there are areas where the ADA is not clear today, and we are in need of guidance.

Mr. Chairman, in the great State of Georgia, scores of businesses have received demand letters for their websites, that their websites should be considered public accommodations; and demand letters to say those websites do not comply with the ADA, when these businesses do not know how to make their websites comply with the ADA.

Fifty credit unions alone, Mr. Chairman--folks who are in the business of serving our communities--have received these demand letters, unable to respond.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter into a colloquy with the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe), if he would be willing, and ask if he is aware of the issues created by this emergence of technology and the predatory litigation that credit unions, community banks, and other small mom-and-pop businesses are facing.

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Mr. WOODALL. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

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Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his guidance.

Of course, there was no opportunity for the ADA to anticipate the internet, to anticipate websites. So it is unclear whether or not Congress intended for websites to fall inside the public accommodations statute.

Because of this ambiguity, though, all of the small businesses-- everyone with a website presence, Mr. Chairman--are unclear about whether or not they are violating the law. They don't even have a framework of guidance so that they could comply with the laws that I know each and every one of these credit unions, community banks, and small businesses wants to do.

Mr. Chairman, I would ask the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) if he would be willing to commit to working with me to encourage the Justice Department to move forward with some guidance in this area so that we could provide certainty not just to credit unions and not just to community banks, but to all of these small businesses looking to do their very best to comply with the ADA?

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Mr. WOODALL. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

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Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

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Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Chairman, these are small businesses that want to do their very best to comply with the ADA. With guidance, they will be successful in that effort.

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