Category: Reasonable Accommodations/Undue Burden

Employers with employees on leave often wrestle with the situation where the employee has exhausted all leave available under policy and statute, but are still not able to return to work and seek additional time off, usually supported by a doctor's note. While the FMLA or similar statutory leave may no longer be available, I know I am often discussing with my clients whether further leave should be offered due to potential reasonable accommodation...

This past weekend, I became a proud first-time father of a beautiful baby girl! Among the many helpful and prescient pieces of advice my wife Mikah and I received from others during her pregnancy were variations on the theme of, “Get sleep while you can.” Words of wisdom, indeed. Recently, however, a college professor argued that his difficulty in getting a restful night’s sleep was not only an inconvenience but one that rendered him disabled...

Last year the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) tooted its horn with a victory when a three-judge panel on the Sixth Circuit held (2-1) that Ford Motor Company might have violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by failing to permit an employee with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) from teleworking up to four days a week.  Reversing that decision, the en banc Sixth Circuit held (8-5) that there was no ADA violation because...

In a 2-1 decision, the First Circuit Court of Appeals held that an employee who prematurely ended the interactive process when she quit could not maintain her ADA failure to accommodate claim against her former employer.  In EEOC v. Kohl's Dep't Stores, Inc., No. 14-1268 (1st Cir. Dec. 19, 2014), Pamela Manning, a sales employee with diabetes, had requested a steady and predictable work schedule from the department store, where she worked from 2006...

In Feist v. Louisiana, No. 12-31065 (5th Cir. Sept. 16, 2013), the Fifth Circuit concluded that a former employee of the Louisiana Department of Justice (LDOJ) was not required to demonstrate that she needed a designated parking spot in order to perform an essential job function. Pauline Feist, a former assistant attorney general for the LDOJ, sued her former employer under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), alleging that the LDOJ...