ADA Restoration Act
Are you a working adult who has AD/HD? Are you a student concerned about
receiving appropriate accommodations at your college or university? Does
your child attend a private school that does not receive federal
financial assistance and may be in need of appropriate accommodations
due to AD/HD or another disability? If the answer is yes, then the
Americans with Disabilities Act Restoration Act is crucial legislation
for you to know about. This legislation is intended to restore the
original intent of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the major civil
rights law for people with disabilities. The ADA has been particularly
important in protecting the rights of persons with disabilities in
employment and students in private schools, colleges and
universities.
To be eligible for reasonable accommodations in employment, an
individual with a disability first needs to be able to perform the
essential duties of the job without
accommodation. If an individual finds that his AD/HD creates a
"substantial impairment” in a major life activity, then he may be
considered an individual with a disability under the ADA. As such, a
person may have the right to accommodations in the workplace and to be
free from discrimination. An example of an accommodation is wheelchair
accessibility. For a person with AD/HD, an example might be an office
with fewer distractions.
Unfortunately the extent that a disability is protected in employment or
the educational setting has been limited by a series of recent court
cases (Sutton v. United Air Lines, Toyota v. Williams).
Some of these court cases have involved adults with AD/HD (Knapp v.
City of Columbus, Calef v. Gillette). These decisions have
seriously eroded the rights of people with disabilities and have watered
down the definition of what an eligible disability is under the
Americans with Disabilities Act. The courts have created a "catch-22"
that allows employers to say a person is “too disabled” to
do the job but “not disabled enough” to be protected by the
law. People with conditions such as AD/HD, mental illness, epilepsy,
diabetes, HIV, and cancer, who manage their disabilities with
medication, prosthetics, hearing aids, etc., are viewed as being
“too functional” to have a disability and are then denied
the ADA’s protection even if they experience discrimination due to
their disabling condition.
Currently people who are turned down for a job or terminated because the
employer may mistakenly feel they cannot perform the job—or
because the employer does not want to provide “reasonable
accommodation” to enable the individual to do the job—are
denied the ADA’s protection from discrimination. A college student
may be unable to receive reasonable accommodations in his classes, if
the school feels his disability is well managed by medication and does
not constitute a substantial limitation, even though the student needs
assistance with note taking or a non-distracting testing
environment. Representative Steny
Hoyer (D-MD) has introduced the Americans with Disabilities Restoration
Act (HR 3195), which would redress these narrow interpretations of the
law. He has been joined by 244 cosponsors. The bill is designed to:
• amend the definition of
“disability” so that people who Congress originally intended
to protect from discrimination are covered under the ADA;
• prevent courts from
considering “mitigating measures”—such as eyeglasses
or medication—when determining whether a person qualifies for
protection under the law; and
• modify findings in the
ADA that have been used by the courts to support a narrow reading of
“disability.”
This bill is now moving through the process of consideration by the US
Congress. CHADD and other disability organizations strongly support
the passage of the ADA Restoration Act. We will be updating all CHADD
members regularly as this legislation moves forward and asking for your
support.
Please let your Representative know that you urge him or her to
approve HR 3195, the ADA Restoration Act. Your voice is needed
now so that the rights of individuals with disabilities are restored and
that individuals with disabilities with be given an equal opportunity to
participate with the accommodations they need. Go to our Federal Policy page for tips on contacting
your Representative, or go directly to CHADD's Action Center.
If you would like more information on the protections provided by
the ADA, read the What We Know sheet available on the Web site of
CHADD’s National Resource Center on AD/HD: Legal
Rights: Higher Education and the Workplace.
Posted February 5, 2008
Update
Read the letter from the National Health
Council to members of Congress expressing support for the ADA
Restoration Act.
Read the letter from the Epilepsy
Foundation to the Society for Human Resource Management
expressing disappointment with SHRM's opposition to the ADA Restoration
Act.
Posted March 21, 2008
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