ODA Committee Update
dated March 28, 2003

ONTARIANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT COMMITTEE UPDATE ODA Commitee Calls On Three Party Leaders To Ensure a Barrier-Free Election Campaign March 28, 2003 SUMMARY As our second step in our barrier-busters activity in the upcoming election campaign, the ODA Committee has written to Premier Eves, Liberal Leader McGuinty and NDP Leader Hampton, asking them to ensure that the election campaign is barrier free. We offer our help and suggest actions that the three party leaders and their parties and candidates can take. See letter below. MORE DETAILS On March 26, 2003, the ODA Committee kicked off its Election 2003 activities by writing to Ontario's Chief Elections Officer John Hollins to call for a barrier-free election. He has authority over the process of the actual voting. He does not have authority over certain other aspects of the election campaign, e.g. all- candidates' debates, election leaflets, etc. Accordingly, to address the barriers which persons with disabilities can face in other aspects of the campaign, we have written to the three party leaders to ask for their help and leadership. We make practical suggestions on steps they can take and offer our help. We also note in our letter to the party leaders that during the Fall 2001 debate over the Conservative Government's ODA bill we had proposed amendments to the ODA to beef up its provisions regarding barriers in elections. We commend the Liberals and the NDP for putting forward an amendment to the Conservatives' ODA bill based on our recommendations. We regret that the Conservative Party used its majority to defeat that proposed amendment. It also used its majority to prevent any debate on the proposed amendment. It gave no reason for its opposition to our recommendations. We ask the three party leaders to support our recommendations now, even though they were defeated by the Conservatives in December of 2001. We welcome your feedback on the letter to the party leaders. Write to us at: oda@odacommittee.net ***** ONTARIANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT COMMITTEE c/o Marg Thomas 1929 Bayview Avenue, Toronto ON M4G 3E8 Tel: (Voice direct) 416-480-7686 Fax: 416-480-7014 Voice mail: 416-480-7012 email: oda@odacommittee.net TTY: c/o Susan Main 416 964-0023 ex. 343 Web site: www.odacommittee.net March 27, 2003 Premier Ernie Eves Legislative Building, Room 281 Queen's Park Toronto, Ontario M7A 1A1 Dalton McGuinty, MPP Leader of the Official Opposition, Room 325, Main Building Queen's Park Toronto, Ontario M7A 1A4 Howard Hampton Leader of the New Democratic Party, 2nd Floor Legislative Building, North Wing Queen's Park Toronto, Ontario M7A 1A5 Dear Sirs, Re: Ensuring A Barrier-Free Provincial Election Campaign I write on behalf of the Ontarians with Disabilities Act Committee. We are a voluntary, non-partisan, province-wide coalition of individuals and community organizations. For more than eight years we have led the charge to achieve a barrier-free Ontario for 1.9 million Ontarians with disabilities through the enactment and effective implementation of a strong and effective Ontarians with Disabilities Act. Our mission is far from completed. A provincial election is widely expected to be called as early as this spring. We want to ensure that this provincial election is a barrier-free one, in which all voters with disabilities can fully participate. We are writing to ask each of you and your parties and candidates to take all possible steps within your mandate to ensure that the entire election campaign process will be barrier-free for all voters with disabilities, be their disability a physical, mental and/or sensory one. We also want to offer you our help in this important activity. Our goal is a barrier-free election campaign culminating in a barrier-free vote on election day in which all voters with disabilities can have their democratic say in the choice of the next government. When the current Ontario Government brought forward its new Ontarians with Disabilities Act 2001 in the fall of 2001, it committed, among other things, that no new barriers would be created in Ontario against persons with disabilities. We hope and trust that all would agree that there is no reason why voters with disabilities should face any barriers in the upcoming provincial election campaign and vote. All we need is effective advanced planning. We have recently written to the Chief Election Officer requesting him to take all the steps he can within his jurisdiction to ensure that there are no barriers impeding voters with disabilities in the actual voting process. In our March 26, 2003 letter to him, which we copied to each of you, we provided detailed feedback on the kinds of barriers which voters with disabilities have faced in past elections. We also suggested strategies for preventing these barriers in the future. We ask each of you to write to the Chief Election Officer to support our requests for action set out in our March 26, 2003 letter to him. As you know, the Ontarians with Disabilities Act 2001, which the Government passed over 15 months ago, only requires that within three months after the election, every returning officer for an electoral district must prepare a report on the measures that the officer has taken to provide accessibility for electors with disabilities in the district and that these reports be made public. The Act does not say what actual steps these election officials must take to achieve a barrier-free election. As well, the Government has not passed any regulations under the ODA 2001 to spell out specific steps that must be taken to ensure a barrier-free election. When the current Government's ODA bill was before a Standing Committee of the Legislature in the fall of 2001 for clause-by- clause debate, both the Liberals and the NDP each proposed an amendment to the ODA which we had recommended. Specifically they proposed that the ODA add the following new obligations to the Elections Act: "Accessibility" obligations (0.1) Despite anything in section 34, all ballots shall be in a form that enables electors with disabilities, wherever possible, to mark the ballots by themselves and in private. Polling places (0.2) Despite anything in section 13, the returning officer shall ensure that no polling place is located so that it is not accessible to electors with disabilities unless satisfied that is impossible to locate the polling place in the polling division within eight kilometres of the location that the returning officer would have chosen, if it were not for this subsection. Same (0.3) Every returning officer for an electoral district shall ensure that all polling places in the electoral district provide American Sign language interpretation or other similar accommodation where needed for electors who are deaf, deafened or hard of hearing, to enable them to vote at no charge to the voter who requires such accommodation." We regret that the Conservative Party used its majority on that Standing Committee to both defeat this amendment and to prevent any debate or discussion about it in that Standing Committee. (See Hansard, Standing Committee on Finance, December 11, 2001.) The Government gave no reasons for opposing our proposal. We ask you nevertheless to encourage the Chief Election Officer to take measures such as these now, in addition to those spelled out in our March 26, 2003 letter to the Chief Elections Officer. In addition, the Chief Election Officer does not have a mandate to address many kinds of barriers in the election campaign process, particularly those barriers that pertain to the election campaign that are not tied to the actual voting process. We therefore are turning to you, as the leaders of the three main parties which will be participating in the forthcoming election campaign, for your help. We ask you and each of your parties and your individual candidates, to do what you can individually and working together to ensure a fully barrier-free campaign and election. We have received feedback from voters with disabilities that as recently as in the last general provincial election in 1999, and even in provincial by-elections since then, they encountered too many barriers in getting access to such things as all-candidates' debates and party election campaign materials. You, your party organizations and your individual candidates are in a unique position to help make this a barrier-free election campaign by taking a number of steps. We offer the following as just some examples: - ensuring that your campaign written material is available, on request, in alternative formats, such as Braille and large type, for those who cannot read conventional printed materials, and making sure that all of your campaign offices are aware that this material is available. The public should be made aware of the availability of this alternative format material. - ensuring that voters who are deaf, deafened and hard of hearing can communicate with you, your local candidates and your campaign offices e.g. by installing TTY devices at your campaign offices. - ensuring that all of your campaign meetings and events are in accessible location. This means not only that there are no stairs, but that there are accessible washrooms and parking located nearby. - providing accommodation for people who are deaf and hard of hearing at your campaign events. This could include real-time captioning and sign language interpreters. - only agreeing to have your candidates appear at all-candidates' debates that are held in a location which is fully accessible to persons with disabilities, and ensuring that accommodations are provided for voters with disabilities at these events e.g. through the provision where needed of sign language interpreters and captioning. - campaign ads and television appearances should be close-captioned while printed information appearing on the screen should be read aloud for the benefit of those who cannot read print e.g. persons who are blind, vision impaired or dyslexic. - offering accessible transportation assistance to voters with disabilities who need such assistance to get to the polling stations and major campaign events such as all-candidates' debates. - having your campaign offices publicly offer to do everything possible to reasonably accommodate other requests that may be made by people with disabilities. - ensuring that your campaign websites are designed to be fully accessible to and usable by persons with disabilities e.g. ensuring that the information on those websites is available in a format that can be read by adaptive technology used by blind, vision impaired and dyslexic computer-users. We would be pleased to do whatever we can to assist in ensuring that this is a barrier-free election. There is no reason why in the year 2003 voters with disabilities should not be full and equal participants in this important democratic process. Yours truly, David Lepofsky, C.M. Chair Ontarians with Disabilities Act Committee cc: The Hon. Carl DeFaria 326-9338 Chris Stockwell 325-7755 Dwight Duncan 325-2201 Steve Peters 325-7262 Ernie Parsons 325-4757 Peter Kormos 325-7067 Marilyn Churley 325-3252 Tony Martin 325-3720 Nadia Temple, Director, Accessibility Directorate Jeff Adams, Chair, Accessibility Advisory Council of Ontario

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