Website · November 2, 2026 · 6 min read
Fixing municipal website accessibility: what AI can help with and what staff must test
Turn an accessibility report into assigned fixes. Use AI to group findings, have staff check the page or document, and retest the resident's task before closing an issue.
By Altioras Civic
Key takeaways
- Keep the original report finding and URL beside every proposed fix; an AI summary must not replace them.
- Assign content, template, document and external-service problems to the people who can change them.
- Check the corrected page and complete the resident's task before closing an issue. A clean scan alone is insufficient.
Start with the service residents need to use
A website scan produces a long issue list. Communications can change page text, IT owns the template, and the application form belongs to an outside supplier. Before anybody closes items, the web lead needs to decide who fixes each problem and how staff will check the result.
Choose a resident task, such as finding permit instructions and opening the application form. Include the service page, linked document and any external destination. Record the URLs, report date, affected control or content, and what a person cannot do. Keep a resident's reported difficulty even if the scanner did not flag it.
Toronto's Digital Accessibility Standard, modified April 15, 2026, combines automated and manual testing and records review outcomes and remediation dates. It is Toronto's own standard, not a rule for every municipality. Have your accessibility lead confirm the applicable requirements and scope for your jurisdiction before setting acceptance criteria.
Use AI to organize findings without losing the original detail
Altioras Civic's AI-first approach would use an approved tool to group a scan export and draft a list of corrections for staff to review. Supply finding IDs, URLs, rule descriptions and approved page excerpts. Exclude form submissions, account details and other restricted information.
Ask for the original finding ID, proposed group, affected page or component, suggested correction and likely responsible team. Keep the scanner's message in a separate column. Require the tool to flag uncertain matches and missing information instead of declaring an item fixed.
Have the web lead compare a mixed sample with the original report before processing more pages. Check that separate problems were not merged and that repeated template defects were not assigned to dozens of content editors. Return incorrect groups for correction. AI may propose an image description, but the content owner must check what the image communicates in that page's context.
Keep this as a proposed drafting method using a separately approved tool. It does not assume a built-in AI feature in the municipality's CMS, and it should not change or publish website content on its own.
Assign each correction to someone who can make it
For each confirmed problem, record a named employee or supplier contact, the proposed correction, a due date and who checks it. Separate an editor's content change from a template or application defect that needs development work.
Use the checks below to prepare a working list. Add the actual finding ID, URL and test result to your internal copy. These are examples of checks, not a complete accessibility assessment.
Follow each finding through to a checked correction
- Step 1Read the findingConfirm the URL and the task that is blocked.
- Step 2Assign the fixName the editor, developer or supplier responsible.
- Step 3Review the changeCheck the draft against the original problem.
- Step 4Retest the taskRecord the result and any work still required.
| What to check | What staff inspect or try | Who checks the result |
|---|---|---|
| Page headings | Read the heading structure and confirm it describes the page's sections in a sensible order. | Content editor and accessibility reviewer |
| Image descriptions | Compare the image's purpose and surrounding text with its alternative text; resolve missing or misleading descriptions. | Department content owner |
| Keyboard use | Follow the service route without a mouse. Check visible focus, logical movement and the ability to leave each control. | Accessibility tester and web developer |
| Form instructions and errors | In an approved test environment, check field labels, required information and error messages using synthetic entries and relevant assistive technology. | Accessibility tester and form supplier |
| Linked documents | Check the actual file's reading order, headings, links and relevant table structure, not just the page linking to it. | Document author and document-accessibility reviewer |
| Shared templates | Retest the corrected menu or component on affected page types; check text enlargement and contrast as part of the review. | Web developer and accessibility tester |
Sources: W3C WAI — Easy Checks: A First Review of Web Accessibility; City of Waterloo — Make your content accessible
Put the reviewed change through the CMS
In a proposed Payload CMS project, a developer could configure fields for image descriptions, document links, content owners and review dates. Payload fields define the stored content and generate the corresponding editing interface. The team must design those fields and how the public website renders them; adding a field does not make its contents accessible.
Where Payload drafts are enabled, editors can save unpublished revisions for review. Have the department owner check the content and the accessibility reviewer check the affected page or file in the proposed preview. Agree and test who may publish. Drafts alone do not create the municipality's full approval process.
The developer would need to configure any AI-assisted import and check which draft or published content the public website retrieves. This is a proposed implementation, not a claim about an operating municipal deployment.
Use the same review and retest requirements with the municipality's existing CMS. Ask its supplier which changes editors can make, which require template development and who will maintain the corrections after a software update.
Sources: Payload — Fields Overview; Payload — Drafts
Retest the page, the document and the handoff
Run the relevant automated checks again, then repeat the manual task that exposed the problem. W3C's Easy Checks covers first-review checks such as keyboard access, headings, text resizing, image alternatives and forms. It expressly warns that passing these checks does not establish that a page has no significant barriers.
Ask an accessibility tester to use the relevant assistive technology and check the complete service route. Include the external form or payment destination when it is part of the agreed scope. Record the browser, device, assistive technology where used, test date and result. Have the department owner confirm that corrected instructions still match the approved service requirements.
Waterloo's public content guidance includes both checker tools and manual review for documents. Keep the linked file in the review: correcting a link label does not repair a document's reading order or form fields.
If a supplier must make the correction, send the URL, steps to reproduce, expected behavior and actual result through the agreed support channel. Keep the issue open until the correction is available and the assigned reviewer has repeated the test.
Sources: W3C WAI — Easy Checks: A First Review of Web Accessibility; City of Waterloo — Make your content accessible
Close the item with a result staff can trace
The web lead should record what changed, who checked it, the test result and where the accepted version is published. If the task still fails, assign the remaining work and a follow-up date. Use the municipality's process for unresolved barriers and access requests; do not mark the whole service accepted because one report score improved.
Add the relevant checks to the editor's publishing procedure and the developer's release checklist. Recheck shared components after changes and train document authors on the issues found in their files. Keep review dates and responsible staff current.
Altioras Civic's Website Modernization & Maintenance service can help scope the issue list, staff assignments and testing needed for a municipal website.
References
- City of Toronto — Digital Accessibility Standard, Validation and Record Keeping; modified April 15, 2026 (opens in a new tab)
- W3C WAI — Easy Checks: A First Review of Web Accessibility (opens in a new tab)
- City of Waterloo — Make your content accessible (opens in a new tab)
- Payload — Fields Overview (opens in a new tab)
- Payload — Drafts (opens in a new tab)