U.S. Supreme Court Confirms Our 7th Circuit Win in an ADA Accommodation Case

Posted by Attorney David McClurg in Reasonable Accommodations, Employer-Employee Relationship, Labor Relations / Comments

Several months ago, we told you about a case alleging that our client, Heartland Woodcraft, violated the ADA by denying an employee's request for an additional 2-3 months of leave to undergo back surgery after he had exhausted three-months of FMLA leave on conservative treatment alternatives. Heartland denied the request because it needed to fill the employee's second shift lead position, and believed it would only be able to find a competent replacement if it offered applicants a permanent position - but asked the employee to re-apply once he recovered from his surgery. Instead of reapplying, the employee sued, claiming that the Heartland should have “accommodated" his disability by granting him the additional 2-3 months of job-protected leave.

A federal judge in Milwaukee dismissed the case holding that a multi-month leave is not a “reasonable accommodation." The employee appealed, and in Severson v. Heartland Woodcraft, the 7^th Circuit affirmed the dismissal, holding that “the term 'reasonable accommodation' is expressly limited to those measures that enable a person to work. An employee who needs long-term medical leave cannot work and thus is not a 'qualified individual' [subject to protection] under the ADA." The Court went on to note that Severson's position would transform the ADA into a “medical leave entitlement" – which it was never intended to be.

With the aid of the University of Chicago Law School Supreme Court Clinic, Severson filed a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari requesting that the U.S. Supreme Court review the 7^th Circuit's decision. They argued that the case was wrongly decided, that there is a “significant split" among the various Federal Circuit Courts on the issue of the reasonableness of extended leave as an accommodation under the ADA, and that this case presented an “ideal vehicle" for the Court to resolve that split.

Because our client, Heartland Woodcraft, believes that the 7^th Circuit's decision in its favor was correctly decided, and that there was no reason for the Supreme Court to review that decision, Dave McClurg, lead counsel on the case, filed a Brief in Opposition to the Petition. Citing many of the same arguments and precedents raised before the 7^th Circuit, including a 2014 decision authored by recently appointed Justice Neil Gorsuch when he was a 10^th Circuit judge, our brief argued that the Severson case was correctly decided, and that there is no serious conflict among the circuit courts on the issue of extended leave as a reasonable accommodation meriting the Supreme Court's review.

On April 2, 2018 the Supreme Court issued an Order denying the Severson's Petition for Certiorari, leaving intact the decision of the 7^th Circuit Court of Appeals in favor of Heartland Woodcraft. This is a great win for our client and gives the 7^th Circuit's decision greater weight in other areas of the country where the issue of the reasonableness of leave as an accommodation under the ADA may come up. Here, in the states included within the 7^th Circuit, it is now absolutely clear that employees needing two or more months of leave in order to be able to return to work are not “qualified individuals with disabilities" subject to the protections afforded by the ADA.

However, the Wisconsin state courts have not addressed this question under the provisions of the Wisconsin Fair Employment Act, which also requires reasonable accommodation of disabilities. While employers will have a strong argument that the reasoning of the 7^th Circuit should also be applied in interpreting Wisconsin's statutes and administrative rules requiring reasonable accommodation of disabilities, it remains possible that the state's administrative agencies and courts could take a different position.

Questions also remain as to the reasonableness of requested leaves of less than 2-month's duration. Judge Diane Sykes, author of the Severson decision, suggested that leaves of “a couple of days or a couple of weeks" might be reasonable, but not “extended leaves." The reasonableness of requested leaves between 2 weeks and 2 months remains an open question, though one earlier 7^th Circuit case found a leave of 4 weeks to be a reasonable accommodation under the particular facts of that case. Employers that are considering denial of requests for leaves of less than 2 months should be prepared to demonstrate, as an alternative to the argument that the requested leave is not a “reasonable accommodation," that the requested leave would cause the employer “undue hardship."

If you have questions about the Severson case or other labor & employment questions, please feel free to contact Dave McClurg at (414) 223-6956 or dmcclurg@petriepettit.com.