The City of Houston is Taking Steps to Bridge the Digital Divide

The “digital divide” refers to “the economic, educational, and social inequalities between those who have computers and online access and those who do not.” This divide can affect access to justice (for self-represented litigants in civil courts), education, employment opportunities, and more.

In May 2019, the Pew Research Center stated the following with regard to lower-income Americans: “Roughly three-in-ten adults with household incomes below $30,000 a year (29%) don’t own a smartphone. More than four-in-ten don’t have home broadband services (44%) or a traditional computer (46%). And a majority of lower-income Americans are not tablet owners.” As a result, “many lower-income Americans are relying more on smartphones” for internet access. Further, in August 2019, the Pew Research Center found that about “25% of Hispanics and 23% of blacks are ‘smartphone only’ internet users – meaning they lack traditional home broadband service but do own a smartphone. By comparison, 12% of whites fall into this category.”

As of October 2019, the Texas Comptroller reported that “[m]ore than 2 million Texas households don’t have high-speed internet.” In addition, the nonprofit group Common Sense found in 2020 that “34% or 1.8 million K-12 public school students in Texas do not have adequate access to the internet at home, and that 25% of Texas’ kids do not have an adequate device at home like a laptop or a computer.”

Locally, Comcast has partnered with the City of Houston on two initiatives designed to help bridge this digital divide. First, the Houston City Council “approved a $624,960 program to provide internet vouchers to low-income Houstonians,” which provided “approximately 5,000 vouchers to qualifying applicants” in December 2020. The vouchers were to “ensure qualifying applicants can continue to stay connected to the internet for education, work, and personal health reasons for one calendar year.” The second initiative involves WiFi-connected “Lift Zones” in nine City of Houston Community Centers. These “Lift Zones” are intended to offer “robust WiFi hotspots in safe spaces designed to help students get online, participate in distance learning and do their homework.” This program provides free WiFi in the designated community centers for the next three years.

Finally, even if you are not covered by these initiatives, our blog post from October 6, 2020 discusses a map of free WiFi spots in Texas, which allows you to enter your address and search for free public WiFi within a specified distance.

Service Dogs Only - Not Snakes - on Planes: Dept. of Transportation Issues New Rule

On December 2, 2020, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) issued a final rule which, among other things, defines a service animal as “a dog that is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of a person with a disability.” This is a revision of the DOT’s Air Carrier Access Act (ACAA) regulation “on the transportation of service animals by air to ensure a safe and accessible air transportation system.” The effective date is 30 days after it was published in the Federal Register, which was December 10, 2020.

The Air Carrier Access Act of 1986, codified at 49 U.S.C. §41705, prohibits air carriers from discriminating against individuals with “a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.” The DOT issued implementing regulations at 49 C.F.R. Part 382, and 14 C.F.R. 382.117 is titled, “Must carriers permit passengers with a disability to travel with service animals?” This new final rule “removes 14 C.F.R. 382.117 and adds a new subpart, Subpart EE, on service animals.” The new rule explains in footnote 1 that:

“The Department’s ACAA definition of a service animal in this final rule is similar to the definition of a service animal in the Department of Justice (DOJ) regulations implementing the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 28 CFR 35.104 and 28 CFR 36.104. Although DOT has chosen to closely align its ACAA service animal definition with DOJ’s service animal definition under the ADA, the substantive requirements in this final rule differ from DOJ’s requirements for service animals under the ADA in various areas, e.g., allowing airlines to require service animal documentation and prohibiting the use of voice control over a service animal.”

According to the DOT briefing, also issued on December 2, emotional support animals are specifically no longer recognized as service animals. It is important to note that, according to the DOT FAQs on this rule, “Although emotional support animals and other pets are not service animals, the rule does not prohibit their transport. An airline may choose to transport them as pets pursuant to its established policy.”

In addition, the DOT briefing explains that airlines are required “treat psychiatric service animals the same as other service animals,” but airlines are also allowed “to limit the number of service animals traveling with a single passenger with a disability to two service animals.” There are other provisions as well, which are summarized in the DOT brief and detailed in the final rule.

For additional information on federal and Texas state laws regarding service animals, please refer to the Texas State Law Library’s Guide on Service Animals.

COVID Vaccine Roll-Out in Harris County, Texas, and the United States

This morning, the first COVID vaccine dose was administered in the United States, on live television, to a critical care nurse at Long Island Jewish Medical Center named Sandra Lindsay. Around the same time, doses of the vaccine began arriving in Texas by air freight. MD Anderson was the first hospital in Houston to receive a shipment and will start administering the vaccine to its frontline employees on Wednesday.

Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, the vaccine will be free for the vast majority of recipients. Almost 20,000 doses are already here in Houston, and 75,000 more will arrive in town tomorrow. Since each vaccine requires two doses, that is enough to vaccinate roughly 47,000 of the more than 4 million people living in Harris County. While that number seems small, it is over 42% of the 224,250 doses arriving in all of Texas this week.

Of course, more doses will be coming, but the roll out will be too slow to allow even more immediate inoculation of all hospital workers who risk exposure on a daily basis. The limited number of doses in Harris County will be prioritized for certain healthcare workers, and residents of the sorts of long-term care facilities that have been ravaged by the virus nationwide.

This tracks with the statewide plan for Texas, which is to prioritize the vaccination of healthcare workers.

On the national level, the FDA has approved the Pfizer vaccine, which is the one currently being distributed and administered, and is the agency is expected to approve the Moderna vaccine by the end of this week. Though there are some differences, both vaccines require two doses to reach full efficacy, and both vaccines work through the use of messenger RNA, which you may remember from high school biology.

It is impossible to contract the coronavirus from either vaccine, though some patients will experience side effects.

Some confusion may stem from the fact that social distancing, mask-wearing, good hand hygiene, and limited contact with others will have to continue until a large enough swath of the nation is vaccinated. Dr. Anthony Fauci anticipates this will take until next fall, though some epidemiologists have estimated it could even take through early 2022. There are a few reasons for this.

One reason is that the vaccine will protect vaccinated people from becoming gravely ill with Covid, but may not entirely stop vaccinated people from becoming sick.

Another reason is that even if an infected person has been vaccinated and does not become ill, they will probably still be contagious.

Additionally, it is still unclear how long immunity from the vaccine will last.

As they say, every journey begins with a single step. Today, the United States took a giant step towards a return to a world where we can once again hug our families and friends.