The AACCENT Act creates a new federal grant program to help people who have difficulty speaking or being understood. The Department of Health and Human Services will give money to three different organizations in different parts of the country to set up resource centers. These centers will help people with significant speech disabilities by providing access to special communication tools and technologies—like devices that help people communicate without speaking—as well as training and strategies to use them. This applies to people who struggle to speak or understand spoken words and would benefit from alternative ways to communicate, but doesn't include people whose main communication challenges are related to hearing or vision problems. Essentially, the government is funding specialized centers across the country to be hubs of knowledge and support for people who need help communicating in non-traditional ways.

AACCENT Act

Casey, Robert P., Jr.

Augmentative and Alternative Communication Centers of Excellence and National Technical Assistance Act or the AACCENT Act This bill establishes a grant program to create national resource centers on augmentative and alternative communication. Specifically, the bill requires the Department of Health and Human Services to award three grants in geographically diverse regions to establish a network of these resource centers for individuals with significant expressive communication disabilities, particularly through improved access to tools, technologies, strategies, training, and other methods. Significant expressive communication disabilities are communication disabilities (other than communication disabilities that are primarily visual or auditory in nature) that prevent or significantly limit an individual from understanding or being understood using spoken words, resulting in the need for or benefit from augmentative and alternative communication.