Several courts have held that an employer violates the ADA simply by refusing to provide a reasonable accommodation regardless of whether the refusal adversely affects the employee. Put another way, these courts hold that the ADA creates an independent claim for failure to reasonably accommodate a disability in and of itself.
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals distanced itself from these other decisions yesterday in Beasley v. O’Reilly Auto Parts. It held that an employer cannot be held liable for a failure to accommodate unless the employee suffers an adverse employment action because of the failure to accommodate. There is no independent cause of action for a mere failure to accommodate unless the failure negatively impacts the employee’s hiring, advancement, discharge, compensation, training, and other terms and conditions of employment.
Beasley was a hearing-impaired worker who required an interpreter for some work-related purposes. The employer failed to appoint an interpreter at various times during Beasley’s employment, including when he attended mandatory weekly safety meetings, and during a disciplinary meeting involving his attendance issues. When Beasley sued under the ADA, the trial court dismissed the action because Beasley’s requested accommodation was not necessary to enable Beasley to perform the essential functions of his job. After all, attending weekly safety meetings and participating in disciplinary meetings were not part of his job description.
The Eleventh Circuit overturned much of the trial court’s decision. Most importantly, the Court of Appeals made clear that no independent “failure to accommodate” claim exists in a vacuum. Unless the failure to accommodate adversely affects the employee, it is not separately actionable. This sets the Eleventh Circuit apart from a number of other courts of appeals.
At the same time, the Eleventh Circuit took its own prior precedent head on while addressing another complex ADA issue. The employer argued that it was not obligated to provide an interpreter to Beasley because that accommodation did not have any bearing on whether he could perform the essential functions of his job. The court addressed several prior Eleventh Circuit cases that appear to hold an employer is only obligated to provide reasonable accommodations that assist or enable an employee to perform the essential job functions, not job functions that are ancillary. The court poo-pooed those decisions, concluding that they are not binding because their rulings in that respect were dicta. The court then resolved the issue without scrapping its prior precedent by holding that Beasley’s participation in weekly safety meetings and his disciplinary meetings were essential functions of his job; because an interpreter would have allowed Beasley to more effectively participate in the safety and disciplinary meetings, it was a required accommodation.
This case seems more than ripe for Supreme Court attention. In one opinion, the Court of Appeals appears to create or exacerbate a circuit court split on failure to accommodate claims, while essentially creating a split within its own circuit on the need to accommodate with respect to non-essential functions. Last year, the Supreme Court denied review in a Tenth Circuit case involving the first issue, but this case is more impactful considering the circuit court and seeming intra-circuit splits.
But discrimination in the form of a failure to reasonably accommodate is actionable under the ADA only if that failure negatively impacts the employee’s hiring, advancement, discharge, compensation, training, and other terms, conditions, and privileges of his employment....Because Beasley’s disability is his deafness, he must show that any failure of O’Reilly to accommodate his deafness negatively impacted the hiring, promotion, firing, compensation, training, or other terms, conditions, or privileges of Beasley’s employment.
