- ADA Title II deadline passed on April 24, 2026, requiring WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance for local governments with over 50,000 residents.
- 42% of the 158 scored city sites still had at least one critical accessibility barrier after the deadline.
- CMS vendor choice strongly predicts accessibility risk; CivicPlus sites had a 72% critical barrier rate vs. 24% for Granicus/Vision/OpenCities.
- 45% of city sites failed WCAG 4.1.2 (Name, Role, Value), the criterion most cited in ADA lawsuits.
- 23% of attempted city sites blocked automated audits due to aggressive bot protection.
- Cities over one million residents had the lowest critical barrier rate (13%), while mid-size cities (100,000–250,000) fared worst (44%).
- 11 cities achieved a perfect score of 100, demonstrating that compliance is achievable.
- Critical barriers were more common on homepages (34%) than on service pages (25%).
- Automated scanning is the floor; true barrier counts are higher due to issues needing human judgment.
- The study recommends auditing sites, focusing on platform fixes, and testing key transactional pages.