The EEOC, despite major budget cuts and a stated goal of suing on behalf of classes or employers engaged in a pattern or practice of discrimination, decided to sue on behalf of a woman fired after only 2 days on the job allegedly because she had a prosthetic leg.

The EEOC is the federal administrative agency that authorizes individuals to sue for employment discrimination matters including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.), the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (29 U.S.C. § 621-629), and the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. § 12101 et seq.).

The Chicago Tribune reports that, in the face of a federal discrimination lawsuit, the IHSA has changed their policy to allow disabled athletes to participate in some competitions.

The IHSA also created three events specifically for athletes with various disabilities.  With the backing of the Illinois Attorney General, one student, Mary Kate Callahan, 17, has filed suit against the IHSA alleging violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Federal Rehabilitation Act.  Early settlement talks were unsuccessful.

If you are a person with various accessibility needs and you feel that your are being discriminated against by anyone, contact an attorney to discuss whether the law provides a remedy that you can seek in court.

Each title of the ADA provides specific and general rights, privileges, powers, and protections and a litigation or transactional attorney can help you enforce your rights or draft agreements to protect and clarify rights or obligations under the ADA.

The Seventh Circuit, on September 7, overturned a Northern District of IL decision awarding summary judgment to United Airlines over their policy of placing disabled employees in vacant positions only when a more qualified candidate was not available.  

In EEOC v. United Airlines, Inc., 11-cv-1774, the EEOC alleged, and the Seventh Circuit agreed, that United Airlines violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to immediately assign disabled employees who required reasonable accommodations to vacant positions as long as they are qualified for those positions and that placing the employees in such positions did not present an undue hardship to the employer.