Skip to main content

One to Keep An Eye On: EEOC v. WalMart (Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals)

 

As with many labor & employment law related cases (and bills) being litigated around the country, there are always a few that stand out.  This is one to keep an eye on.


A recent case out of the Seventh Circuit caught my eye as it turns on whether WalMart provided a reasonable accommodation to a disabled employee.  In the case, Paul Reina (“Reina”), worked at WalMart as a cart attendant but was limited due to his severe cognitive delay and legal blindness.  While Reina could physically push carts, he could not steer them.  As well, he was unable to attend to motorized carts and could not response to basic customer service questions.  WalMart chose to hire a job coach for Reina who helped Reina steer the carts, operate the motorized carts, and answer customer questions.

Following a new manager being hired, it was determined that the job coach assisting Reina should no longer continue.  The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) subsequently sued WalMart and alleged violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”).  The case went to a jury in 2019 in which the jury found WalMart in violation of the ADA.

WalMart subsequently appealed the jury’s verdict on the grounds that Reina was not a “qualified individual” under the ADA.  WalMart argued that its decision to accommodate Reina beyond what the ADA required should not be held against them.  In this case, WalMart noted that if another employee came to them and said they could not steer carts, operate motorized carts, or answer customer questions, “no one would claim that the ADA would require WalMart to hire and allow a job coach to perform these essential job functions for [the employee].”

It is worth noting that generally speaking, the ADA has not required employers to hire another employee to provide a disability accommodation.  However, whether the hiring of another employee creates an “undue hardship” on the employer (in regard to the accommodation request) focuses on the resources of the employer.  If this were a “mom and pop” employer, I think this would be an entirely different situation.  I find it hard to believe that a court would find that a small(er) employer would be required to accommodate a disabled employee by hiring another person to do many/a majority of the disabled employee’s job responsibilities.  However, an employer like WalMart likely could accommodate this request to enable a disabled employee to do their job.  Does that mean the Seventh Circuit will uphold the jury verdict?  Not necessarily.  With that being said, oral arguments are set for Friday.  For those interested, this is a case worth keeping an eye on going forward.


For additional information:  https://www.bloomberglaw.com/public/desktop/document/EEOCvWalMartStoresIncetalDocketNo20034737thCirDec182020CourtDocke?1632836502

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NLRB: Discussion Among Employees About Tip Pooling is Protected Concerted Activity

  This Advice Memorandum from the National Labor Relations Board’s Associate General Counsel, Jayme Sophir, addressed whether employees which discussed and complained about tip pooling at work constituted protected concerted activity. In relevant part, an employer in New York operated a chain of steakhouses.  While tip pooling was in place at these steakhouses, some of the employees objected to it on the grounds that it was not transparent and improperly divided tips among the workers.  Employees were told not to complain or talk to each other about the tip pool and were told that doing so would endanger their jobs.  Despite the employer later attempting to provide some clarity as to how the tips were being divided, rancor still existed among some employees.  At one point, the employees were told by a general manager that some employees that had been talking about the tip pool were “cleared out” and the employer would continue to do so. In the Advice Memorandum, it was noted that emplo
Post a Comment
Read more

What I’ve Been Reading This Week

A few years ago, I remember when the “Fight for $15” movement was taking off around the country.  Lo and behold, it appears that a $15/hour minimum wage is not the stopping point, which should be no surprise.  As the below article notes, New York is aggressively moving to ramp up hourly wage rates even higher.  While all the  below articles are worth a read, I called particular attention to that one. As always, below are a couple article that caught my eye this week. Disney World Workers Reject Latest Contract Offer Late last week, it was announced that workers at Disney World had rejected the most recent contract offer from the company, calling on their employer to do better.  As Brooks Barnes at The New York Times writes, the unions that represent about 32,000 workers at Disney World reported their members resoundingly rejected the 5 year contract offer which would have seen workers receive a 10% raise and retroactive increased back pay.  While Disney’s offer would have increased pa
Post a Comment
Read more

Utah Non-Compete Bill Falters in House

Last month, a non-compete bill sponsored by Representative Brian Greene (Republican from Pleasant Grove) & up for vote in the Utah House failed to make it through the Legislature.  The bill sought to ban enforcement of non-competes if they came after a worker was already employed, given no compensation (such as a bonus or promotion) for signing the non-compete, and laid off within six months.  However, by a 22 - 49 vote, the bill was resoundingly defeated after some business groups lobbied to kill the non-compete bill.  One group in particular, The Free Enterprise Utah coalition, argued that the Utah State Legislature should hold off on any changes to non compete laws in the state until a survey about non competes was done among Utah businesses.  Representative Greene had countered this claim and argued that a survey was not needed to show that the current non compete laws in the states allowed many businesses, including some small high tech companies in the state, to per
Post a Comment
Read more