Decision brief · 28 July 2026
What a 2.27:1 floor would actually do
You asked me to prove it. Fair. Here is the case, with the part where you are right first, because it is the more important part.
You are right about the hero images
I checked, and it happened. On NewToBoulder, in commit
6502552, I darkened the hero scrim to pass the check. The exact change:
12% dark at the top, where your headline sits
82% dark at the top. Nearly seven times heavier.
That is a real loss and you were right to notice it. The photograph you paid for is mostly gone at the top of the frame. My commit message even said it "opens back up mid-frame so the photo still reads", which is me talking myself into it.
One correction so the tally is honest: the dark scrim on SmartStrongAlive was not the contrast rule. That was the "Editorial + teal blocking" direction you chose on 16 July. I found one site where the rule actually darkened a hero, not multiple.
But here is what 2.27:1 lets through
2.27 is not a slightly-relaxed standard. It is close to no standard. Try to read these. Each line renders at the exact ratio labeled, on white:
The two middle rows are the point. Grey text at 2.32:1 would pass a 2.27 floor. If you can comfortably read that fourth and fifth line, the floor is fine. If you had to lean in, that is what would ship unflagged across all eighteen sites, forever, with nothing left to catch it.
The tradeoff you are angry about is not a real tradeoff
This is the actual argument. The hero got darkened because I reached for the crudest tool: dim the whole photograph until the number goes green. There are better ways, and I already used one of them in that same commit without applying the lesson to the rest of the hero.
All four heroes below use your real Boulder photograph. All four pass 4.5:1 on the text.
Everything you need to know before you go
Everything you need to know before you go
Everything you need to know before you go
Everything you need to know before you go
The rule never required a dark hero. My implementation did. Lowering the floor would fix my bad implementation by removing the thing that caught it.
What it would cost you specifically
Not an abstract compliance point. Two concrete ones:
- Your readers. SmartStrongAlive is written for women over 50. Contrast sensitivity is one of the first things to go with age, well before anyone calls it a vision problem. The people most likely to squint at 2.32:1 gray are precisely the people you write for. They will not email you about it. They will just leave.
- You cannot see it yourself. You are reading on a good laptop screen indoors. The failures show up on a phone in sunlight, which is where a lot of "where do I eat in Boulder" traffic actually happens.
What I am not claiming: that anyone is likely to sue you, or that your gold buttons are ugly. They are not, and I said so in the numbers below.
Your gold, specifically
The buttons you like, measured:
This is why I do not think you have to choose. The gold stays exactly as it is. Only the letters on top change color, and to my eye the second one looks more expensive, not less. If you disagree, that is taste and taste is yours: I will exempt the gold on SEOBeliever by name and leave the rest of the check standing.
What I recommend
- Keep the 4.5:1 floor global. It is the thing that caught my own bad work twice this month.
- Exempt your gold by name on SEOBeliever, so it stops nagging you about a decision you have already made.
- Let me undo the NewToBoulder hero and rebuild it with a local panel, so you get the bright photograph back and it still passes.
If you read all this and still want 2.27 globally, say so and I will set it. It is your business and your call. I just did not want to make that change quietly.