Ensuring access to jobs for people with disabilities

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Ensuring access to jobs for people with disabilities

Courtesy of Vanita Gupta, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division

Americans with disabilities can face many unnecessary barriers to employment, both during the job application process and on the job. These barriers can prevent people with disabilities from finding and maintaining a job, receiving promotions and ultimately being economically self-sufficient and independent.

During the job application process, applicants with disabilities may not want to disclose their disabilities to potential employers for a number of reasons, including the risk that the employer would refuse to hire them because of their disability. Sometimes employers stereotype people with disabilities or take adverse employment actions because of misinformation or ignorance about certain health conditions. Having to disclose a disability can deter people with disabilities even from applying for jobs out of fear of discrimination.

Recognizing these real risks, Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) makes it unlawful for an employer to ask about whether an applicant has with a disability or about the nature of such disability before making a conditional offer of employment. Under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, however, federal contractors subject to affirmative action requirements must invite an applicant voluntarily to self-identify as an individual with a disability, consistent with certain requirements.

Despite the ADA’s prohibitions, some employers still ask job applicants if they have a disability and about the nature of the disability, in violation of the ADA. Over the past few months, the Department of Justice found that several public employers were making these kinds of inquiries right in their job applications. To resolve these violations, the department entered into settlement agreements with nine different public entities. These jurisdictions include the entities Parowan, Utah; Española, New Mexico; DeKalb, Illinois; Vero Beach, Florida; Fallon, Nevada; Isle of Palms, South Carolina; Hubbard, Oregon; Village of Ruidoso, New Mexico; and Florida State University.

These settlement agreements require the entities to remove the unlawful questions from the applications and follow all requirements of the ADA with respect to job applicants and employees. Further, to help prevent future violations, the settlement agreements require that the employees who make hiring and personnel decisions be properly trained on the requirements of the ADA. In addition, the entities must designate an individual to address ADA compliance and report on compliance to the United States.

Today, many job applications are completed online. Another barrier to employment faced by some people with disabilities, such as those who are blind or have low vision, are deaf or hard of hearing, or have physical disabilities affecting manual dexterity (such as limited ability to use a mouse), is that online job applications are not fully accessible to them. Individuals with these disabilities use assistive technology, such as screen reading software and captions, to access online information. But websites need to be designed to work with these technologies. Without the ability to access a job application, people with disabilities will not even have the opportunity to apply for a job in the first place. Several investigations conducted by the department found that the public entity’s online employment opportunities website or job applications were not fully accessible to people with disabilities. To resolve these violations, the entities must ensure that their online employment opportunities website and job applications comply with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0, which are industry guidelines for making web content accessible.

Ensuring that job applications are free from unlawful questions and accessible to all applicants is essential to enable people with disabilities to find work and advance in their jobs. With equal access to employment, hardworking Americans with disabilities can contribute as valued members of the workforce, and both justice and economic advancement are served.

For more information on the department’s ADA Title I employment discrimination settlement agreements and consent decrees, visit

www.ada.gov.

Posted in:

Civil Rights Division

The Department has enforced the rights of people with disabilities to remain in their communities rather than be institutionalized.

The Division's U.S. v. Georgia case was the first to use our authority under the ADA and Olmstead to demand creation of additional community services instead of institutional services. The settlement provides relief to more than 12,000 Georgians with developmental or mental health disabilities who remained at risk of unnecessary institutionalization more than a decade after the landmark Olmstead v L.C. decision involving these very same state hospitals.

Since the settlement in Georgia, the Division has completed investigations and entered into Olmstead settlements in Delaware, Virginia, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Rhode Island and elsewhere, helping approximately 46,000 people with disabilities return to, or remain in, their communities. The Division is involved in additional significant state-wide investigations.

In April 2014, the Department entered into a first-of-its-kind settlement agreement with the State of Rhode Island that will provide relief to approximately 3,250 individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities who have been, or who are at risk of, unnecessary segregation in sheltered workshops or facility-based day programs. Under the court-enforceable Consent Decree, individuals with disabilities will have access to an array of services, giving them the opportunity to receive meaningful employment in integrated community settings at competitive wages. More specifically, individuals in the target population will receive services to support a 40 hour week, with the expectation that they will work, on average, in an individualized job at competitive wages for at least 20 hours per week, and will receive wrap-around integrated day activity services instead of being housed during non-work hours in facility-based settings.

The Division has maintained ADA.gov/Olmstead as a resource for advocates, states and persons with disabilities. It is a resource-rich web page with information and tools on ADA issues.

http://www.justice.gov/opa/blog/ensuring-access-jobs-people-disabilities

http://www.justice.gov/accomplishments