In July 2022, DRA filed a class action lawsuit in the Western District of Washington against Providence St. Joseph Health and Western HealthConnect for their consistent failure to ensure effective communication for d/Deaf patients seeking medical care at Providence’s Seattle-area facilities. Read the complaint here. Providence is the largest health care provider in Washington with hospitals, … Continue reading “Spencer v. Providence St. Joseph Health”
In December 2021, Disability Rights Advocates and National Association of the Deaf filed a lawsuit against three major providers of podcasts, SiriusXM, Stitcher, and Pandora, to end their exclusion of deaf and hard of hearing Americans from each company’s extensive podcast streaming service. Read the complaint here. Because Defendants do not make transcripts available for … Continue reading “National Association of the Deaf v. Sirius XM”
On September 21, 2021, Planet Fitness, Inc., one of the largest and fastest-growing global franchisors and operators of fitness centers with more members than any other fitness brand, and the Paralyzed Veterans of America, National Council on Independent Living, and American Council of the Blind (collectively “Coalition for Inclusive Fitness” or the “Coalition”) announced a … Continue reading “Planet Fitness”
On July 20, 2021, DRA filed a class action lawsuit against the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) on behalf of Deaf human resource (HR) professionals who do not have equal access to SHRM’s services because SHRM fails to provide accommodations like sign language interpreters, captioning, and timely transcripts for SHRM’s continuing education programming. SHRM … Continue reading “Ruffa v. The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)”
Disability Rights Advocates (DRA) would like to speak with individuals who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing, are Providence Health Washington patients, and have experienced any of the following problems at a Providence Health Washington facility within the last two years: unqualified interpreters; problems with VRI; delay in providing an interpreter; not providing an interpreter … Continue reading “Deaf Access at Providence Health Washington Facilities”
In a landmark agreement, advocates for people who are blind have obtained WarnerMedia’s pledge to increase the accessibility of HBO Max—the much-anticipated online streaming platform that was launched in May 2020. Among other commitments, the agreement provides that WarnerMedia will provide audio description on at least 1,500 hours of new and existing programming on HBO … Continue reading “HBO Max Structured Negotiations”
In September 2020, DRA filed a class action suit on behalf of San Francisco’s LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired and two of its employees against payroll processing and HR giant, ADP TotalSource and its parent company Automatic Data Processing, Inc. for failing to make their industry-leading products and services accessible to blind managers and … Continue reading “LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired v. ADP TotalSource”
First Urology is a full-service urological medical and imaging practice with roughly twenty locations in Kentucky and Indiana. First Urology is required by law to buy equipment and train its staff to help people with disabilities lift onto examination and imaging tables. Instead, First Urology has a written policy stating that patients requiring assistance to … Continue reading “Fust v. First Urology”
In October 2018, Disability Rights Advocates filed a class action lawsuit alleging that Mobility Works—the country’s largest provider of wheelchair accessible vehicles for sale or rent, and a major installer of adaptive devices—employed two policies that discriminated against drivers with disabilities. Mobility Works denied these allegations, and does not admit liability. But, after extensive negotiations, … Continue reading “Community Resources for Independent Living (CRIL) v. MobilityWorks”
On November 26, 2019, Disability Rights Advocates (DRA) filed a class action lawsuit against Queens Borough Public Library, The Board of Trustees of the Queens Borough Public Library, and the City of New York, challenging the inaccessibility of Queens’ newest library branch, Hunters Point Library. Plaintiffs Tanya Jackson and Center for Independence of the Disabled … Continue reading “Jackson v. Queens Borough Public Library”