|Help

Mediating Employment Disputes under the Disabilities Act - Chapter 19 - AAA Handbook on Employment Arbitration and ADR - Third Edition

Author(s): 
Samuel H. DeShazer
Judy Cohen
Page Count: 
18 pages
Media Description: 
1 PDF Download
Published: 
December, 2015
Author Detail: 

Samuel H. DeShazer is a Shareholder with the Louisville office of Hall, Render, Killian, Heath & Lyman, PSC where his primary practice areas are management, labor relations and personnel law. Mr. DeShazer holds a B.A. from Western Kentucky University and a J.D. from the University of Louisville. He is on several arbitration/mediation panels, and has served as neutral in a number of disability cases.

Judy Cohen is Executive Director of Access Resources, a New York City-based mediation firm concentrating in workplace and disability-related disputes. Ms. Cohen is a neutral on many mediation rosters, including the United States District Court, Eastern District for the State of New York She has published and presented extensively on the topic of Americans with Disabilities Act and ADR.

PDF616.57 KB

$40.00
Description: 

Originally from:

AAA Handbook on Employment Arbitration and ADR - Third Edition

Preview Page

I. Introduction

The intent of Title I, the employment section of the Americans with Disabilities Act, is to open up employment opportunities to individuals with disabilities in order to bring them into the economic mainstream. The ADA includes legal and technical requirements that impose both restrictions and affirmative obligations on employers.
 
We do have some basic premises: In order to assist the parties in analyzing and resolving their case, the ADA mediator must know the law. However, the legal issues are not isolated. The skilled mediator can help the parties deal with the many underlying issues, including emotional ones. Finally, the ADA mediator needs a good command of disability etiquette and appropriate language and needs to be able to set up and run an accessible session.
 
In this chapter, the substantive ADA legal requirements are followed by examples of issues that might be raised by the parties in a mediation setting and tips for the mediator in dealing with these issues. (The mediator should also be aware of state and local laws that may provide more stringent requirements than the ADA.) In analyzing an ADA case, it is most productive to go step by step through the concepts with the parties (for example, agree on what the essential job functions are before discussing reasonable accommodations).