Changes to the rules will affect everything from the height of light switches and kitchen counters to the layout of miniature golf courses and fishing piers, The Wall Street Journal Online reported. Disability groups long have waited for the revisions, which clarify and update the rules that were put together hastily after the act was passed in 1990.
But the costs have some property owners scared. The top issue is whether the Justice Department exempts or includes existing buildings in the new rules. That distinction could raise the cost to businesses from tens of millions to potentially billions of dollars.
The exact costs of the retrofit option are an unknown. The Access Board, the independent federal agency that drafted the proposed rule changes, says the new requirements will add 0.01 percent to 0.5 percent to the cost of construction projects. But that applies only to new construction, not retrofitting existing structures.
The proposed rule updates are widely known; what is in question is how widely they will be applied. The Access Board drafted them over the past decade, and published versions periodically. It issued final updates in July 2004, sending them on to the Justice Department, the primary agency responsible for implementing them. The Department of Transportation also plays a role.
If applied only to new buildings, which is one of the proposals the Justice Department is considering, the added cost would be $26.7 million a year, according to the Access Board's economic analysis. Each additional wheelchair-accessible vanity in a hotel, for instance, is $752. An additional van-accessible parking space costs $344.
That cost would skyrocket if applied to existing buildings under an ADA provision that property owners must remove existing barriers when "readily achievable," a term that makes some businesses wary.
Because the costs going forward on new building are so low, the rules as applied to new construction and renovation don't seem to be a sticking point. Some business groups actually welcome the changes since the new, proposed rules reflect features and formatting already in local building codes.
The Justice Department is considering the 800-plus comments from groups as diverse as the Little People of America to the WingHaven Country Club in St. Louis. The comments run the gamut. Golf-course owners complain about possibly having to provide specialized carts. Movie-theater owners don't want to install wheelchair-accessible seating in the upper level of a stadium-type theater. Disability groups want the changes quickly, saying they have waited over a decade for the updates.
The Justice Department won't say when its version of the rules are to be unveiled, let alone adopted. Some in the building industry expect them within a year, though things could take a bit longer than expected because the assistant secretary in charge of the process recently left to become a prosecutor. President Bush has yet to announce a successor.
