San Bernardino Disability Discrimination Lawyers
California law provides strong protections to employees with physical and mental disabilities. It is illegal for an employer to discriminate against employees who are disabled or have a history of disability. In addition, employers are required to offer reasonable work accommodations to employees with disabilities to help them perform their jobs.
Compensation for instances of disability discrimination can include:
- Damages for lost income
- Damages for emotional stress
- Exemplary damages to punish the employer in egregious cases
At Broslavsky & Weinman, LLP, our San Bernardino disability discrimination lawyers represent employees who have been the target of discrimination at work or denied reasonable accommodations. We aggressively advocate for our clients’ rights and have helped numerous victims of disability discrimination and failure to accommodate obtain recovery and hold employers accountable for violating their rights.
Common Examples of Disability Discrimination
Disability discrimination can occur in various ways, with some of the more common forms including:
- Firing or demoting disabled workers due to their impairment(s)
- Requiring disabled workers to perform tasks that go against their medical restrictions
- Refusing to provide disabled workers with time off to get medical care
- Refusing to make reasonable accommodations for disabled workers. Reasonable accommodations can include (but are by no means limited to) modifying work schedules, altering job responsibilities, and providing special equipment
- Retaliating against disabled workers who request accommodations
What Conditions Are Recognized as a “Disability”?
Disabilities can be either long-term or short term as long as they are sufficiently serious. California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act define disability as any physical or mental condition that limits one or more major life activities. Major life activity” is broadly defined to include a basic physical, mental, and social activities such as walking, standing, bending, lifting, performing other manual tasks, seeing, hearing, talking, reading, and learning. Some common examples of conditions recognized as disabilities include:
- Broken bones, torn tendons, or back injuries
- Diseases such as cancer, heart disease, or diabetes
- Neurological impairments such as severe migraine headaches, seizures and nervous system disorders
- Psychiatric or mental impairments such as post-traumatic stress syndrome or clinical depression
- Visual, speech and hearing impairments
- Gastrointestinal ailments such as Crohn’s disease
- Muscular dystrophy and carpal tunnel syndrome
What Are the Employer’s Duties to Accommodate a Disability?
Where an employee is capable of performing his job but needs reasonable accommodations, it is unlawful for an employer to refuse to provide these accommodations and then fire or punish the employee for failure to perform. A non-exhaustive list of possible accommodations includes:
- Job restructuring or modification of job duties
- Offering modified work schedules
- Reassignment to a vacant position
- Allowing work from home
- Permitting leave of absence for medical treatment or to allow time to recuperate
- Acquisition or modification of equipment to help employee do his or her job
Interactive Process Requirement
When an employer becomes aware of the need for accommodation, it is required to engage in a “good faith interactive process” with the employee to discuss potential accommodations. The employer is expected to review and understand the employee’s restrictions, compare them to the employee’s job or other jobs available, and determine how to accommodate those restrictions. An employer that either does not engage in the interactive process or engages in an insufficient interactive process may be held to violate the law.
Contact Us
If you have been discriminated against based on disability or denied reasonable accommodations, our San Bernardino disability discrimination lawyers can assist you. Call us at (909) 551-4455 or fill out the contact form on this page to find out more about how we can help.
With offices in both San Bernardino and Los Angeles, we provide representation to employees throughout all of San Bernardino County, including, but not limited to Ontario, Upland, Fontana, Redlands, and Rancho Cucamonga.
