Accessibility
Individuals with disabilities represent a large part of the population in Ontario. Approximately 1.85 million or 15.5% of Ontarians have a disability. Predictions state that the number of people with disabilities will continue to grow as the population ages.
Addressing accessibility in the Town of Amherstburg
The Town of Amherstburg is committed to providing high quality goods and services to all members of the public and responding to the needs of an accessible community through:
- The Amherstburg Accessibility Advisory Committee which provides advice and recommendations to Council on accessibility issues within our community;
- Accessible Customer Service training for all employees of the Town of Amherstburg;
- A feedback form that allows the public to provide input on the accessibility of the provision of goods and services by the Town of Amherstburg;
- A Multi-Year Accessibility Plan was adopted in December of 2021 by Council and explains how the Town will meet accessibility standards over the following 5 years inclusive of annual reporting on previous years in the Plan as an appendix (Also available in Large Print format here).;
- Providing an accessible website; and,
- Annual reporting of the Town's compliance with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. (View the most recent Accessibility Compliance Report). For instructions on how to force download the document, please click this link.
Website accessibility
The launch of our new website continues the Town's movement towards providing an accessible environment for all residents. BrowseAloud is a tool used by the Town to provide a more accessible website.
BrowseAloud
BrowseAloud provides help to website visitors who require online reading support and who prefer to listen to information instead of reading it. This tool has many features to assist people with dyslexia, literacy difficulties, mild visual impairments, and where English is a second language. BrowseAloud is free to use and works with all major website browsers.
Using BrowseAloud on your computer
To launch BrowseAloud on the Town of Amherstburg website, click on the BrowseAloud icon at the top of the Town's web pages. There may be some links on the Town's web pages that lead to websites, which do not have BrowseAloud functionality.
Use the floating toolbar to access BrowseAloud features and options. The toolbar is keyboard accessible and the text description of each button can be read aloud. This toolbar provides instant high quality speech at the touch of a button.
How to use toolbar features
The following information outlines how to use the different toolbar features for BrowseAloud.
Hover to speak mode
To hear text read aloud from a computer, move your mouse pointer over the text, and to hear text from a touch screen device, touch the text. There may be a slight delay before the text reading begins. BrowseAloud will also read PDF documents.
Speak the current selection
As an alternative to hover highlighting, you can select specific text to hear it read aloud.
MP3 maker
Select any text on a web page and convert it into an MP3 file. Save the file to your computer or device to listen to at a later time.
Text magnifier
Activate the text magnifier button on the toolbar and then hover on or select any text that you want to hear and see magnified at the same time.
Screen mask
You can focus on just part of the screen using this feature. Masking applies a colour filter to the whole screen and places a "window" in the area you are reading.
Further Information
If you have any additional questions or require assistance with accessibility needs, please contact accessibility@amherstburg.ca.
