You are not required to submit your plan to the government or Disability Alliance BC. However, your plan must be made available to the public. And we hope that you will produce a plan that feels worthy of celebrating and sharing widely!
Where to publish your accessibility plan
Your public website is the natural location to share the plan.
What formats to offer
There is no guidance in the regulation itself, but the BC Government’s own accessibility plan is offered in a variety of alternative formats including as an accessible webpage, an accessible pdf, as an American Sign Language video, and in seven languages other than English.
Ensuring your plan is accessible
Whether you choose to publish your plan as a webpage or as a downloadable document on your website will in part depend on the existing accessibility of your website. If the website has not been assessed for accessibility or you know that the website is inaccessible, you may decide that an accessible pdf version on a simple page will be the best approach. This would allow you to also send the plan via email to users who are finding your website difficult to use.
If your internal communications team will be involved in the design and delivery of the plan, they will likely need to connect with an accessibility consultant who can ensure that the final plan is remediated and will work for screen reader users and readers with other print disabilities.
This approach is likely more manageable and cost effective than remediating the accessibility of the webpage itself. For example, if you wanted to publish your plan as a blog post and needed to ensure that the page was accessible, you would need your web developer or webmaster to be involved in assessing the page and website architecture. If you are curious about the degree of accessibility issues a user may experience with your existing site, you can use online tools like Web AIM’s free WAVE tool or hire an accessibility testing service to provide a report for you.
Ensure any announcement is accessible
If you plan to announce your published plan on your social media channels, you can take steps to ensure that your announcements are accessible. Accessible Social is a free resource hub for digital marketers, communication professionals, content creators, and everyday internet users who want to begin learning how to make their social media accessible for people with disabilities. Small steps like including alternative text on images and capitalizing the first letter of each word in a hashtag are easy requests of your social media team that will engage them in the work too. If you plan to launch your plan with an in-person or online event, you can also ensure that your event will be accessible. The City of Vancouver has shared much of their learning on this topic in a great resource titled Accessible events checklist and resources.