Employee Handbook

Section 3 — EMPLOYEE RELATIONS

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a federal anti-discrimination statute designed to remove barriers which prevents qualified individuals with Disabilities from enjoying the same employment opportunities that are available to persons without Disabilities.

Reasonable Adjustment

Reasonable Adjustments are modifications made to enable employees with Disabilities to work in another way so the disability doesn’t undermine the employee’s performance. The ADA does not relieve an employee or applicant with a disability from the obligation to perform the essential functions of the job and all employees must meet the same performance standards and requirements. Reasonable Adjustments might include, but are not limited to, making facilities accessible, adjusting work schedules, restructuring jobs, providing assistive devices or equipment, changing office layout to eliminate or reduce barriers, or providing interpreters. Whether the Adjustment is reasonable depends on the job and circumstances.

Request for a Reasonable Adjustment

Although full medical details do not need to be given by the employee, the employee should be prepared to explain how their disability impacts their work. An employee may be asked to provide documentation from their doctor or other health care professional. You may find ideas on Adjustments on the Job Accommodation Network  website which discusses possible accommodations and lists relevant equipment and service providers. Understand that the City may offer alternative suggestions for a reasonable Adjustment. Inability to reasonably make Adjustments are based on, but not limited to: cost, difficulty in implementing the Adjustment, unduly disrupting another employee’s ability to perform their jobs, elimination of an essential function of the job, lowering productivity, providing personal items (such as hearing aids, eyeglasses, etc.), excuse a violation of a uniformly applied conduct rule or that the alternative Adjustment eliminates the need for a leave of absence and will still be effective.

The employee will need to request an Adjustment by informing their supervisor or a member of the Human Resources team by disclosing information about their disability/health condition and requesting that it be accommodated. The supervisor will contact Human Resources and will begin an interactive process with the employee working collaboratively to discuss the need for an accommodation as well as identify reasonable and appropriate Adjustment solutions. All reasonable Adjustment requests are handled on a case by case basis.

In limited instances a request for an Adjustment may pose an “undue hardship” which prevents the Adjustment from being offered. The determination of whether an Adjustment creates an undue hardship is contingent upon a number of variables and is evaluated on a case by case basis.

Pregnancy

To ensure that a pregnant employee can continue to perform their job responsibilities, a reasonable Adjustment may include, but is not limited to: more frequent breaks, private non-bathroom space for expressing breast milk (up to the first year after birth), light duty or modification to the work schedule. Pregnant employees are still under the obligation to inform their supervisor or a member of the Human Resources team of the needed Adjustment(s) and to provide medical information when necessary.

Confidentiality

All information related to requests for Adjustments will remain confidential to the extent possible and will be maintained in Human Resources in a secure file separate from the employee’s personnel record.

Resolving Disagreements

If an employee disagrees with the determination and/or proposed Adjustment they may contact Human Resources or enter into the Dispute Resolution process (See Section 3.6).