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supreme courtIn case your news and twitter accounts are down, and you otherwise have not heard the news…   President Trump has nominated Judge Gorsuch from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit to fill Justice Antonin Scalia’s vacant Supreme Court seat.  There are surely countless articles about his nomination hitting the airwaves even as I type this, but for employers who struggle with leave management issues, a quick review of the Hwang v. Kansas State University decision, authored by Judge Gorsuch, may provide employers with hope that leave management law could move in the right direction. 
Continue Reading Supreme Court Nominee Has Put “Reasonable” into Reasonable Accommodation Obligations

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) suffered a setback in its attempt to establish that the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) requires an employer to reassign an employee to an available position without having to compete with other candidates for that position.  In EEOC v. St. Joseph’s Hospital, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals…

On August 25, 2016, the EEOC issued its Enforcement Guidance on Retaliation and Related Issues. In addition to outlining expanded definitions of “opposition” and “participation” activity with respect to retaliation claims, the EEOC also addressed section 503(b) of the ADA.  Section 503(b) makes it unlawful to “coerce, intimidate, threaten or interfere” with an individual who attempts to exercise ADA rights or one who assists or encourages others to do so.

What Makes ADA Interference Different

In its guidance, the EEOC notes the interference provisions of the ADA are broader than the statute’s anti-retaliation provisions. Specifically, actions that may not be materially adverse for a retaliation claim may suffice for an interference action.  Another distinguishing feature of an ADA interference claim, according to the agency, is that an individual pursuing relief need not be a qualified person with a disability.
Continue Reading EEOC Explains ADA Interference – Employers Take Note

It is common gospel that when a qualified disabled employee requests accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”), both employer and employee must engage in an interactive dialogue to discuss the options.  But what happens when an employee merely identifies a disability but never asks to be accommodated?  In a recent decision, a sharply divided Eighth Circuit held that an employer who learns an employee cannot perform essential duties without accommodation due to a medical condition may need to treat the information as an “implicit” accommodation request.  Such an implicit request can trigger the interactive process even though the employee never specifically asked to be accommodated.  The opinion can be found here. 
Continue Reading Finding the “Implicit” Accommodation Request

What better place to contemplate the ADA issue of whether coming to work is an essential function of a job than at the recent Disability Management Employer Coalition (DMEC) Compliance Conference, an annual three day seminar for those who toil in the depths of disability leave management and love every minute of it?

It all…

When I wrote last week that telework was “in the air” because we were anxiously awaiting the en banc Sixth Circuit decision in EEOC v. Ford Motor Company, little did I know that the decision was likely getting a final review before its release, which occurred on Friday.

Common sense trumps the EEOC’s position on…

With telework as a reasonable accommodation under the ADA in the air as we await anxiously the Sixth Circuit’s en banc decision in EEOC v. Ford Motor Company, a recent decision concerning the EEOC’s failure to provide telework as a reasonable accommodation got my attention.  Miles’ law comes to mind.

Named for a chief of…

A few months ago, I posted my fourth and what I then called my “final” blog on the Sixth Circuit’s significant ADA decision in EEOC v. Ford Motor Company.  I had never posted four blogs about a decision. But that “final” blog has turned out not to be “final” because on August 29, 2014,…

Since 2009, the EEOC has sued numerous employers who have terminated employees pursuant to an inflexible leave policy, a policy that provides a defined amount of leave and results in an employee’s termination once the employee exhausts that leave.  The EEOC argues that such policies are unlawful because they do not allow for additional leave…