Addressing Disability and Ableist Bias in Autonomous Vehicles: Ensuring Safety, Equity and Accessibility in Detection, Collision Algorithms and Data Collection

March 9, 2023
Autonomous vehicles (AVs) have the potential to transform access to transportation and related infrastructure for people with disabilities. AVs and new technologies also come with significant risks of embedding and perpetuating bias and discrimination that permeate society. This brief considers bias within pedestrian detection and collision behavior algorithms, lack of disability representation in the datasets used to train and test AVs, and the need for ethics frameworks that give full recognition to disabled people's humanity and fundamental rights. Policy measures to mitigate the identified risks are proposed.

In Memory of Judy Heumann (1947 – 2023)

March 5, 2023
There's a larger-than-life photo of Judy Heumann in the rotunda of the Ed Roberts Campus in Berkeley, California, where DREDF's office is located. We have rolled or walked past her image thousands of times, but the photo never just blends into the background—like Judy, it always draws our attention.

In Memory of Talina Jones 1980 – 2022

January 13, 2023
On December 27, 2022, we lost Talina Jones, a passionate advocate for disabled children and their families and an activist and scholar working at the intersection of ableism and racism. We share in the grief of her family, friends, and colleagues, and send our deepest sympathies to all her loved her.

Disability Rights Advocates Issue Demand to City of St. Louis to End Discrimination Against Custodial Workers with Disabilities

January 5, 2023
Today Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF) and the ACLU of Missouri (ACLU) delivered a letter demanding that on the mayor and aldermen of the City of St. Louis and judicial leadership end and remedy overt and unlawful disability discrimination against the custodial workers who clean and service the court building.

Comments Providing Information for Better Capturing People With Disabilities in U.S. Census Surveillance

November 15, 2022
While DREDF is encouraged by state actions to equitably recognize their full disability population and more accurately capture their needs, we call on the Census Bureau to both follow the possibilities of what states have done and assume a leadership role in setting a new national standard for disability population data collection. We make the following recommendations...