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Article Excerpt
Amendments to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) went into effect January 1, broadening the definition of disability and opening the door to people who advocates say have been shut out from the ADA's legal protections.
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The changes will make it easier for people with conditions such as epilepsy, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, cancer, and certain mental illnesses to qualify as disabled, lawyers say. "The law reestablishes protections under the ADA for a lot of people with disabilities that are manageable," said Andrew Imparato, president and CEO of the American Association of People with Disabilities, one of the organizations that worked to get the new law passed.
The ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA) also may make it easier for people with disabilities to find lawyers willing to take their cases.
"In 90 percent of cases under current law, the employer would fight the issue of disability, and in 90 percent of those cases they would win that issue, often on summary judgment," said Brian East, a lawyer with the disability rights nonprofit Advocacy, Inc., in Austin, Texas. "As a result, many plaintiff attorneys simply stopped taking ADA cases."
The act says it aims to "reinstat[e] a broad scope of protection to be available under the ADA." Congress expected the definition of disability under the original statute to be interpreted in the same way "handicapped" was interpreted under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, but that has not happened, the act's "findings and purposes" section says.
Court decisions since the ADA was enacted in 1990 have narrowed the scope of protection. The amendments explicitly reject standards that the U.S. Supreme Court and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) have applied, saying they are inappropriately restrictive.
The amendments shift the focus to...
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