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Case number 17-5013, the American Council of the Blind at L Appellants v. Steven T. Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury.

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Mr. Lavecki for the Appellants, Ms.

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Barbaro for the Appellate.

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Good morning.

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Good morning.

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May it please the Court.

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In 2008, the district court issued an injunctive order mandating that US currency be made accessible to individuals with visual impairments.

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For reasons that are completely unrelated to any difficulties in making the currency accessible, the secretary has delayed the implementation of that order

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until 2026.

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The Council submits that a delay of 18 years in making the first denomination of currency accessible is both unwarranted, unreasonable, and unnecessary.

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Can I ask you a couple of questions?

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First, I know when Judge Robertson had the case, he said there is no data showing that the blind and visually impaired use cash more than sighted people.

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And is that still the case?

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It just seems to me that in this cashless society we're going to, that the blind and visually impaired are left out of that.

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I think that's true.

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Certainly when it comes to technology, smartphone technology, which is in any cashless society the lodestone of a cashless society, smartphone technology is largely inaccessible to persons with visual impairments because of the flat touch screen.

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So as a result, the much-bellyhood, cashless society, which clearly we have not arrived at yet, and probably never will in our lifetimes, the much-bellyhood, cashless society probably will present a whole new set of challenges for people with visual impairments.

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Okay, the other question I had was, is my math correct that with these iBill readers and the iPhone and Android, that has been used by roughly 4% of the blind and visually impaired, figuring 3,090,000

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using either one of those machines.

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I think it's probably less than 4% because we have the visually impaired population and the society runs into the millions.

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It's partly a function of just demographic changes in our society as the baby boomers are getting older.

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That was certainly a factor in the increasing numbers of visual impairments.

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So I think that is probably on the high side, 4%.

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I would like to bring to the Court's attention a recent decision from this Court in 2017, government of Manitoba v. Zinke, 849 F.

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3rd, 1111, in which the Court of Appeals said that a

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change, significant change to either factual or legal circumstances requires modification of an injunctive order, assuming doing so would be in the public interest.

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And I think that was a case that we did not cite in our briefs, but I would like to bring that to the attention of the court.

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Can I just ask you a question?

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You started out by saying – referring to, I think, an 18-year delay.

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Is that the years that you calculated?

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Well, it's not necessarily a delay of 18 years.

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It is a – 2008 is when the District Court issued its injunctive order.

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Right.

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Assuming the target date of 2026 is met, the

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injunctive order will – the first denomination of currency would be made accessible in 2026.

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That's how I computed the 18-year period.

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Oh, 18-year period, right.

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Because there was some – there was – everybody expected at the time that the order was entered that there was going to be some period before which you would have a redesigned currency.

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That's correct.

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That's correct, Your Honor.

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Okay.

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So we're talking about the incremental

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deferment beyond the expected period that was already built into the order?

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Yes, yes, Your Honor.

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Okay.

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That's correct.

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And that's with respect, again, I emphasize to the first denomination because the, as to the subsequent denominations, they will go further out.

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Right.

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Do we know the

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how much further out that will be.

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In other words, are you arguing that there's a sort of increased gap between successive denominations, or that there's a delay, clearly a delay, getting started?

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Is there only the delay in getting started?

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Yes, Your Honor.

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I think we have something of an answer to that question.

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In a recent filing within the past month at the district court, it's not part of the

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It's not part of the record, but it is in the district court record.

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The government put out an order indicating that there would be five separate redesigns between – the government actually wrote a letter to a member of Congress stating there would be five separate redesigns between 2026

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and 2038.

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So that would be effectively

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a redesign every two years.

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Now, first of all, that is an internal working timetable set by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

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Technically, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing does not even have the authority to establish a target date for the issuance of currency.

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That can only be done through a recommendation made by the Advanced Counterfeiting Deterrent Committee.

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which is composed of representatives of the Secret Service of the Federal Reserve Board and the BEP, and they would make a recommendation to the Secretary as to a target date.

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that so this is essentially an internal time frame, that internal working time frame, that's the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

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And I think that's significant as well because one of the issues raised by the government in this case is that a redesign in 2020 and another redesign in 2026

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would be confusing to the public.

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But that argument is certainly belied by the fact that the government is planning five separate redesigns within a 12-year period.

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That's approximately one redesign every 2.2 or 2.3 years.

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So it strikes me as apocryphal that on the one hand the government could state that a redesign in 2020 and a redesign in 2026 would be confusing when at the same time, according to its letter to Senator Wyden, they plan themselves on a redesign every two and a half years.

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Are these redesigns

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The portrait changes, or are they anti-counterfeiting?

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Or does the letter say?

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No, I think the letter indicates that the redesigns are major redesigns for security purposes.

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I would just defer.

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I didn't see anything in the briefs on it that a change in a different denomination

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would present less confusion than two changes in each denomination in successive years.

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I think that's correct, Your Honor.

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I think that's correct.

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And I don't see how that would be the case.

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And I think it's also worth noting.

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I'm sorry.

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I'm not sure what you're saying.

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In other words, if the RTF goes ahead on a schedule ahead of, possibly way ahead of, the change for anti-counterfeiting, would that mean each denomination having two changes?

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Well, it depends on how the scheduling would line up.

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The proposed order we asked for was that the $10 bill would be redesigned, and only the $10 bill would be redesigned in 2020.

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In 2026, it would probably be necessary – and the letter to Ron – Senator Wyden indicates that another redesign of the $10 bill would occur in 2026.

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So then there would be, at that point, two redesigns.

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Now, what we're – so what we're asking essentially is that the remaining denominations of currency be redesigned in 2026.

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If that is the case, then yes, there would be another redesign for each denomination after that for security purposes.

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But for what it's worth, Your Honor, I don't place much stock in these internal working deadlines set by the BEP, because in the past they've been way off the mark.

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I understand that.

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And I think it's important to

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state that the Council is not seeking any – forcing the government to provide any specific accommodation.

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That's not what we're asking for.

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We're not seeking any particular accommodation.

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It's really within the government's discretion as to what is the best accommodation.

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We've taken that position since the inception of this litigation in 2002.

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I'm sorry, you mean within the realm of RTF?

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No, Your Honor, we're not – the RTF was not something that was even proposed by the Council.

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The RTF was something that the Secretary decided upon based upon his view that it would be durable, effective, and not unduly burdensome.

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That was a determination made back in 2011.

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It was certainly not our proposal to put an RTF on the bills.

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It was the government's decision.

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What would be other – it seems like the main options that have been discussed in the briefing and in the materials are RTF increasing the size of the images and some sort of reader.

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Is there something else that is a possibility?

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It's not so much about increasing the size of the images.

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It's increasing the dimensions of the currency by denomination.

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So in other words, the $50 bill would be larger than the $20 bill in that.

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The government chose not to do that.

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That's what most countries do.

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But the government decided to do the RTF instead of changing the size, because the government believed that it would be less expensive, put less pressure on the banking system, make it less expensive for the banking system, probably less expensive for the government as well.

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So the other options, of course – I mean, there are any – it's – there are other options.

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Other countries, as indicated in this Court's decision in 2008, do other things.

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There's foil features that are used, perforation features that are used.

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There's a number of features.

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I think the point I was trying to make is that, you know, the government certainly has the discretion to decide which features are correct.

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But with respect to the external currency readers, our position is that those readers do not provide meaningful access because there are other more integrated and efficacious methods available that would not be unduly burdensome.

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So in our view, and the record as it is now, the external currency readers cannot provide, as a matter of law, meaningful access.

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If there are no further questions, reserve the remainder of my time for you.

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Thank you.

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May it please the court?

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Megan Barbaro on behalf of the secretary.

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And I wanted to start with this question that came up about the redesigns.

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And plaintiffs are effectively asking for two separate redesigns for each denomination.

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And also to clarify, the redesign for security purposes to fulfill the statutory obligation to design the currency in the best manner to counterfeit,

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to counteract counterfeiting.

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That's one redesign that's planned.

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It's now been pushed back because of developments in counterfeiting technology.

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But the rollout of the denominations are all done in an orderly manner.

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But that's a single redesign for security reasons with a rollout of the bills to allow them to be introduced into circulation in an orderly fashion.

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Does the history of redesigns for security purposes

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indicate that once one denomination has been redesigned, the others flow fairly quickly?

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That, if we look back, so the most recent redesign was, I believe began in 1996, but then there was rollout beginning in the early 2000s, and those denominations were rolled out fairly quickly, but there was some delay in the most recent redesign for security purposes for the $100 note, and if you look at the projected timeframe and then when

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those notes were actually released.

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There's certainly some delay there.

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And in addition to that, looking back historically...

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Certainly, because historically you needed to have a printing press effectively to counterfeit bills.

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Now you've got color scanners, people with color printers in their home ubiquitous computing devices.

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The technology in counterfeiting is advancing quite rapidly.

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And again, the Secretary is making best efforts to address those security concerns and to release a redesigned family of notes that will be secure against those security threats.

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At the same time, however, the Secretary adopted a three-prong approach to provide meaningful access to the currency.

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The Secretary, as we have detailed in numerous status reports, detailed status reports in the district court,

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including the 18th status report that's docked at number 156, which was filed most recently, the Secretary has made substantial progress in providing meaningful access through the three prong approach.

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Now, one of those prongs is, of course, the... I come out with four percent.

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I mean, with these readers and these iPhone and Android features.

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you have provided meaningful access to 4% of the blind and visually impaired.

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We have, I mean, that number sounds approximately correct.

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We have, as of September, as indicated in the most recent status report, 55,000 iBill readers have been distributed.

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That distribution program just started in 2015.

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It's been widely publicized.

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BEP employees have gone to numerous conferences.

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have an extensive public education campaign around the iBuild reader, have received positive feedback.

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We're not arguing that that alone provides meaningful access, but the reason there's a three-prong approach is because the currency reader can provide immediate access while the secretary is continuing to research and develop the Raise Tactile feature.

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And in addition to the currency readers, of course, the smartphone applications, which is a new technology that

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BEP has supported and helped assist in the development of, we've seen 47,000 downloads of those currency readers onto smartphones.

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And in addition, as we've explained to the district court, and the district court is well familiar with the record in this case, there have been significant efforts on the part of the Bureau to develop a tactile feature

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that works well, which is not something that anyone knows how to do.

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Cleanups have pointed to other currencies, for example, that have tactile features, but as was noted in the study that the Bureau conducted, the Canadian currency, for example, the tactile feature on the Canadian currency, which I believe is about 40 microns compared, or 140 microns compared to

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Braille, which is about 400 microns, wears down very quickly because, of course, notes, unlike a Braille book or something else on which you might find Braille, they're passed back and forth from person to person.

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They're stuffed in pockets.

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They go through laundry machines.

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They wear down very quickly.

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And on the Canadian notes, with notes that have been in circulation, it's less than 50% or around 50%.

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varies from 30 to 60, I think, depending on the bill, but in terms of the ability of somebody who is blind to identify the note.

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Now, it's... Can I just ask this question about the timing?

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So, it seemed like the assumption that attended the entry of the order that we're all talking about was that roughly seven to ten years was the time frame for a redesign?

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That was historically had been the case.

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If that's historically been the case, then let's just assume that everybody kind of had in their minds that that's roughly what's going to happen in the future.

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Then the schedule that's been laid out by the other side is that a

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the redesigned currency that satisfies the needs of the visually impaired would be issued in 2000.

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And then the government says, well, that doesn't make a lot of sense to add that layer on when we're going to have a currency released in 2026 under the current schedule anyway.

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And so I understand that as a general matter that you could have some inefficiencies that attend

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doing things in succession, but the gap is six years, which seems like the gap already assumed by everybody was something like seven to 10.

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So aren't we talking about redesigns on a schedule that is roughly the same schedule that was put forward at the time of the initial order to begin with, or are we not?

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Well, if I may, it would be roughly six years, but again, the district court was well within its discretion in looking at your fundamental inefficiencies, and these are significant, especially when you're talking about adding a tactile feature.

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significantly enhanced security features to the bills.

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And this is discussed in the declarations of Larry Felix that were submitted in connection with the original injunction and the 2012 motion to modify.

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But every time you redesign the currency, you're talking about modifying all of the equipment at BEP.

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There's an entire team at the Bureau that works on this.

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And not just that, but as Teresa finds... Well, that's not necessarily true, because according to WASH,

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He comes up with a figure of 66 million if you do have to change the machines.

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If you don't, and he allows for that, it's 5 million.

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That's correct, and so we don't know exactly what the costs are, but what we do know is that the costs are going to increase significantly if we have to do two separate redesigns as opposed to what the district court anticipated here, which was one redesign that would allow for the efficiencies of doing both the tactile feature and

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the security redesign at the same time.

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But it also anticipated it would be done within seven to ten years and you've doubled that time.

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Well, we were very clear with the district court before the injunction was entered in our memo regarding the injunction that the redesign for security features was not on any

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schedule per se.

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The plaintiffs had suggested... He didn't see it that way.

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He said he just learned that it was required to do this anti-counterfeitering redesign every seven to ten years.

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Now he may have been

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exaggerating what the Treasury fellow said, because I think he said, this is our normal cycle.

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But he interpreted to mean that was a requirement.

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But I want to ask you about the latest year that I saw for your revenue was, I think, 2004, half a billion dollars.

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How much of that revenue is going to these portrait changes?

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Do you know?

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I do not know the answer to that question.

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Would you agree that certainly the visually impaired have a priority over changing the expenses or the cost of changing currency with respect to whose face is on the currency?

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There is absolutely no – there's no suggestion in the record that the Secretary has been doing anything other than exercising best efforts to implement the three-prong approach, including dedicating significant resources

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to the development of the tactile feature.

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That includes a focus group with 50-plus participants, including members from the American Council of the Blind, that was just concluded earlier this year.

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They've now narrowed down the potential tactile features that are being considered.

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The problem is that there are substantial challenges in developing the tactile feature, including the tactile features in this most recent study, the ones that were most

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effective and accurate, participants even with those had a low level of confidence that they were actually determining the currency correctly.

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So there are all these difficulties in coming up with a tactile feature that works well

[00:23:34] Speaker 01:
So it seems like then, what would the government do if the date that was asked for were in fact implemented?

[00:23:41] Speaker 01:
Because there's two large series of objections to that.

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One is that it doesn't make sense to do it because there's going to be another iteration for counterfeiting reasons anyway, and then this is going to result in a great deal of inefficiencies that are potentially disturbing the broader cause.

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The other is that we've decided that the way to go forward is the RTF, is the tactile feature, and that's just not

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physically possible to do anything by 2000?

[00:24:07] Speaker 05:
I don't think there's support in the record for the idea that it would be feasible to implement the tactile feature by 2020, in particular because, as is detailed in the WASH declaration and Mr. Felix's declaration, even once the Bureau settles on a tactile feature, there's still, because it's a change to the currency, a significant rollout period.

[00:24:28] Speaker 05:
The notes have to be tested

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Of course, there have to be changes to everything that uses cash in the economy.

[00:24:36] Speaker 05:
That includes vending machines, cash drawers, ATMs, public transportation systems.

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All of that takes a significant amount of time.

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So even once they settle on a tactile feature,

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It's still a process.

[00:24:48] Speaker 05:
But again, the district court has been carefully monitoring this case.

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And in considering whether the plaintiffs had shown that the current injunction under which the secretary is implementing this three-prong approach was now detrimental to the public interest, the district court was well within its discretion to find that, no, given the substantial progress that had been made.

[00:25:10] Speaker 05:
Four percent?

[00:25:13] Speaker 04:
That's substantial progress?

[00:25:15] Speaker 05:
Your Honor, the district court found that it was substantial progress both in the... I know.

[00:25:19] Speaker 04:
I know.

[00:25:20] Speaker 04:
That's in there.

[00:25:20] Speaker 05:
Yes.

[00:25:20] Speaker 05:
Both in terms of the currency readers.

[00:25:23] Speaker 05:
And again, if you... I mean, we can pull apart the numbers more, but in addition to the currency readers that the Bureau has distributed for free, there were commercially available currency readers that individuals may have purchased before that plan.

[00:25:37] Speaker 05:
Some of those individuals are not in commerce.

[00:25:40] Speaker 05:
I'm not suggesting, and we have not argued, that the currency readers standing alone are providing meaningful access.

[00:25:46] Speaker 05:
They're just part of this plan because they're immediately available.

[00:25:50] Speaker 04:
All right, let me ask you about the private sector costs, because Mr. Wash, again, just says, we've estimated a cost impact of three to four billion.

[00:26:01] Speaker 04:
Now, when you read that with the background of what Judge Robertson found,

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with the statistics that Treasury put forward then and they were just wildly hyperbole and in his footnote 10, granted this is

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ten years ago he said there's little information about the effect of currency changes on third parties the vending machine people say yes maybe not and then he says that that whole study is skewed because they left in the one dollar bills which of course is not anyway affected by the raised tactile feature and so

[00:26:52] Speaker 04:
The currency you've got to produce, one half of it doesn't have to comply with the order of the RTF.

[00:27:04] Speaker 04:
Why should we just assume that Mr. Walsh, who says we anticipate three to four billion to the private sector, just where does that come from?

[00:27:15] Speaker 04:
There's nothing in here to support it.

[00:27:18] Speaker 04:
And he even says it may be required.

[00:27:22] Speaker 04:
His, you're right about this, his declaration sets out countless meetings and confabs and tests and so forth and it just seems like for years you all have been dealing with this and gotten nowhere and here you are with four percent of the visually impaired

[00:27:48] Speaker 04:
getting meaningful access after 10 years and now they have to wait another nine years.

[00:27:54] Speaker 05:
if i may add that that airing study which the bureau commission was a comprehensive study this is in the record i think it's around j eight five ninety and that's part of the study looked at looked at the uh... all of the equipment manufacturers that the impact on them the vending machines all that there is support for all of that in the record but in addition if i point out that

[00:28:21] Speaker 05:
Those costs are costs that will occur whenever the race tactile feature is incorporated.

[00:28:28] Speaker 05:
So we're not saying that because this is going to be particularly expensive, we shouldn't do it.

[00:28:34] Speaker 05:
What we're saying is this is going to be incredibly expensive, we should do it.

[00:28:38] Speaker 05:
in a way that makes sense, that is efficient, where we have the best tactile feature developed which we are continuing to study and research and I understand that it has taken time but this has been a global challenge for years to find a tactile feature that is durable, effective, manufacturable, usable,

[00:28:57] Speaker 05:
These are difficult things to do.

[00:28:59] Speaker 05:
And what the district court did in this case was carefully craft an injunction that would allow the bureau and the secretary in his discretion to develop a plan for providing meaningful access.

[00:29:13] Speaker 05:
We've done that.

[00:29:14] Speaker 05:
We've implemented that plan.

[00:29:15] Speaker 05:
We're continuing to work on that plan.

[00:29:18] Speaker 05:
And the district court was well within its discretion in finding that doing that in conjunction with the statutorily required

[00:29:24] Speaker 05:
redesigned for security threats made good sense.

[00:29:27] Speaker 05:
And even looking back at the record in 2012 and 2017, when there had been some delays, the district court looked at all the progress that had been made, not just in the currency readers, but also in adding larger numerals that assist the visually impaired in denominating the currency and the high contrast numbers.

[00:29:46] Speaker 05:
and said it would – it is not – the plaintiffs have not satisfied their burden of showing that the injunction needs to be modified to impose a date certain on the Secretary.

[00:30:04] Speaker 01:
of predicting these timeframes.

[00:30:08] Speaker 01:
So let's suppose that 2026 starts to come up, and then it turns out there's a whole new wave of counterfeiting that needs to be taken into account, and it turns out that the next iteration isn't going to deal with that.

[00:30:17] Speaker 01:
And so the realization is made, actually, we should defer, and let's go to 2035.

[00:30:22] Speaker 01:
I mean, at some point, from the letter of the injunction, the time frame for redesigning the currency to deal with this would

[00:30:32] Speaker 01:
would extend commensurately.

[00:30:34] Speaker 01:
But at some point, it can't be that just every time that there's a need to defer things for counterfeiting purposes, that means that automatically there's a deferment for these purposes, too.

[00:30:44] Speaker 05:
And at that point in 2026 or whenever that arose, the district court would be looking at the public interest, determining whether the current injunction, which linked meaningful access to the counterfeiting redesign

[00:30:59] Speaker 05:
whether that was still in the public interest or whether circumstances had changed such that plaintiffs could satisfy their burden at that point.

[00:31:06] Speaker 05:
And of course, in addition, given the significant technological developments in these smartphone applications, which... I wanted to ask about that.

[00:31:16] Speaker 02:
First, has there been progress up to this moment in that?

[00:31:22] Speaker 02:
I mean, since it was originally developed.

[00:31:25] Speaker 02:
And is there significant progress anticipated in that?

[00:31:32] Speaker 05:
The answer is yes to both questions.

[00:31:35] Speaker 05:
If you look at, this is document number 156 in the district court record.

[00:31:39] Speaker 05:
It's our 18th status report to the district court.

[00:31:42] Speaker 05:
that discusses both the number of downloads of the smartphone applications that have been developed and also refers to Microsoft's recently released Seeing AI, which is a free application for Apple devices that reads documents and describes objects for blind and other visually impaired persons using the built-in camera.

[00:32:04] Speaker 05:
Now, we understood that Microsoft's...

[00:32:09] Speaker 02:
to the visually impaired person without something public.

[00:32:15] Speaker 05:
Right, and that is a concern in terms of the security of those applications, but both the iBuild currency reader and also the smartphone applications can be used with an earpiece so you can have the information communicated to you directly where others can't hear it.

[00:32:31] Speaker 05:
They also operate with a vibrate function, so they'll vibrate a different number of vibrations or beeps depending on the setting you have.

[00:32:41] Speaker 02:
It's gonna be done in the pocket or pocketbook.

[00:32:47] Speaker 05:
That I don't know.

[00:32:50] Speaker 05:
But there has been an effort to ensure that those are secure for use in public.

[00:32:58] Speaker 04:
What would be wrong with our remanding it?

[00:33:02] Speaker 04:
Because the cost on one side of the scale is the cost to the Treasury.

[00:33:08] Speaker 04:
On the other side is 96% of

[00:33:14] Speaker 04:
Americans who have a right to meaningful access to the currency.

[00:33:19] Speaker 04:
What would be wrong with remanding it for a more specific finding as to the cost of delinking it from the anti-counterfeiting if we

[00:33:33] Speaker 04:
If we take away the private sector costs, because four to six billion just comes out of nowhere, and we concentrate on the treasury costs, that can vary from 66 million to go down to five million.

[00:33:50] Speaker 04:
What's your answer to that?

[00:33:51] Speaker 04:
I just see this as not having been established by a mile.

[00:33:56] Speaker 05:
uh... that the equities and that's what we're looking at under sixty uh... b five uh... if it's equitable to continue this injunction the way it is there is ample support in the record and I want to emphasize that and the district court's order is it's well reasoned it's relatively short but in part that I'm sure it's just as vague as it can be

[00:34:25] Speaker 05:
It's three pages.

[00:34:27] Speaker 05:
The district court refers, though, to the declarations that were submitted, which build on this is a 12-year record in the district court.

[00:34:37] Speaker 05:
The Bureau has conducted length.

[00:34:40] Speaker 04:
But we're dealing with the Declaration of Wash, which I've just gone over, which pulls $4 to $6 billion out of nowhere, which varies from $66 to $5 million for the public costs.

[00:34:55] Speaker 04:
Does anyone have any more questions?

[00:34:57] Speaker 05:
OK.

[00:34:58] Speaker 05:
And if I may just also refer you back to Mr. Felix's earlier declarations in the case, which further support this point and the studies that the Bureau has commissioned.

[00:35:07] Speaker 05:
All right.

[00:35:07] Speaker 05:
Thank you.

[00:35:08] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:35:10] Speaker 04:
How much time does he have?

[00:35:17] Speaker 03:
OK.

[00:35:17] Speaker 03:
Your Honor, I believe this Court said in 2008 that the redesign of currency

[00:35:26] Speaker 03:
for accessibility purposes is no less a statutory objective than the redesign of currency for security purposes.

[00:35:37] Speaker 03:
And I think that's important to keep in mind as to the Secretary's consul's discussion of smartphones, in addition to being inherently inaccessible, the better smartphones that have the better software, such as the Apple software,

[00:35:56] Speaker 03:
are very expensive.

[00:35:58] Speaker 03:
And it strikes me as just very unfair to require people who are visually impaired to be required to buy their way into access to U.S.

[00:36:09] Speaker 03:
currency any more than somebody who is visually impaired ought to either have to pay to get into a wheelchair ramp into this court.

[00:36:19] Speaker 03:
With respect to the issue of the

[00:36:27] Speaker 03:
durability issue.

[00:36:28] Speaker 03:
Well, the fact is, and as noted by this court's opinion in 2008, many other countries are using durable tactile features.

[00:36:39] Speaker 03:
I'd refer this court to pages 1271 to 1272 of the reporter's decision in American Council of the Blind, the then Paulson.

[00:36:50] Speaker 03:
Many other countries are using durable tactile feature.

[00:36:53] Speaker 03:
In fact, I just happened to

[00:36:55] Speaker 03:
find that the new 10-pound UK banknote is very obvious, easy to feel.

[00:37:01] Speaker 03:
It's not a problem.

[00:37:05] Speaker 03:
And it was the government who chose the RTF back in 2011 because they said it would be durable.

[00:37:12] Speaker 03:
And now they seem to be spinning their wheels on this.

[00:37:18] Speaker 03:
And even if a tactile feature is worn, that's nothing to prevent a person with a visual impairment to ask for a different bill.

[00:37:29] Speaker 03:
Easily accommodated request from a cashier.

[00:37:36] Speaker 03:
With respect to the cost issue, I think it's fair to say that the

[00:37:46] Speaker 03:
Walsh declaration, the additional cost he cited to the government of putting in the RTF would be costs that would be incurred in any event, whether or not the two redesigns were paired or separated.

[00:38:08] Speaker 03:
as to the anticipated.

[00:38:09] Speaker 02:
What supports that?

[00:38:11] Speaker 02:
Are you saying that two redesigns cost doing separate things cost the same as one redesign doing both?

[00:38:23] Speaker 02:
Anything in the record supporting that?

[00:38:25] Speaker 03:
No, I don't believe that's it exactly, Your Honor.

[00:38:28] Speaker 03:
My point was more that the

[00:38:33] Speaker 03:
The specific costs cited by Mr. Walsh in his declaration would have been incurred regardless of whether those costs for making the feature to produce – to buy the equipment and to make this durable, tactile feature would be incurred – have to be incurred.

[00:38:58] Speaker 03:
even if the two redesigns.

[00:39:00] Speaker 02:
I guess, at least intuitively, it sounds to me as if he was arguing that there are significant economies of scope and that going ahead, decoupling would increase those.

[00:39:13] Speaker 03:
Oh, unquestionably true.

[00:39:14] Speaker 03:
That's why the district court, I think, ordered it in the first place, to allow them to put the two together.

[00:39:23] Speaker 03:
I think it comes down to, yes, I think you're absolutely right.

[00:39:26] Speaker 03:
I just don't think there's anything in the record on that.

[00:39:32] Speaker 04:
You've gone over your time.

[00:39:34] Speaker 03:
OK.

[00:39:34] Speaker 03:
Thank you.