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Subscribe by EmailHappy Birthday, ADA….And Many, Many More!
As pointed out in this AHI article, the ADA law was signed by George Bush on July 26, 1990, thus we are coming up to the 15th birthday of the law.
While there is much to say about this law that is of interest, I don’t have that much time. But, I did find this interesting case, I believe it was mentioned on pointoflaw.com (or maybe it was on overlawyered.com, I can’t remember).
The ADA case in point, Brady V. Wal-Mart, involved a person who applied for and eventually worked as a part-time sales associate at the Wal-Mart (his disability involved cerebral palsy). For his lawsuit, he won over 2.8 MILLION from Wal-Mart. What did he charge Wal-Mart with?
He successfully argued that Wal-Mart subjected him to two adverse employment actions on the basis of his disability: transferring Brady from the pharmacy department to a position pushing carts in the parking lot, and creating a hostile work environment.
The judge also ruled that Wal-Mart had violated the ADA by including a prohibited inquiry in its job description form (I don’t know what that exactly was).
The lessons for companies?
Train your managers regarding disability issues;
Carefully review your hiring materials to avoid illegal inquiries.
Happy birthday, ADA!
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Two further tips from George:
1) This is another example of the importance of a multi-level, objective decisionmaking process, especially for adverse decisions.
Transfer of a disabled person from the pharmacy department to a position pushing carts in the parking lot would not violate the ADA if done purely for legitimate business reasons.
Such a process would ensure that to be the case and act as a check on any discriminatory impulses of lower-level management.
2) A hostile work environment (harassment) based on disability (or religion, national origin, etc.) is actionable under the same principles as sexual harassment.
Therefore, harassment policies and training should not focus exclusively on sexual harassment, but should cover these variants as well.