Missouri ADA
Posted by Tamara
In 1990, the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) was passed. This landmark law is the primary federal statute governing workers with disabilities. According to ADA, employers must make “reasonable accommodations” for employees who are disabled. The definition of “reasonable accommodations” will vary from workplace to workplace, and from employer to employer.
For instance, a man with epilepsy works for a company as a salesman. Normally, the salespeople use their personal cars to drive to sales meetings and to appointments with clients. The company then reimburses the salespeople for mileage. The salesman with epilepsy is unable to drive. Instead, he takes a taxi or a bus to get to his client appointments. The expense of the taxis and buses may be a bit more than the mileage reimbursement, but it could be considered a reasonable accommodation for the employer to reimburse those costs.
A woman that requires a wheelchair to get around asks that her Missouri employer build a ramp so she can get into the workplace. This is not unreasonable, even for a small business, and can cost an employer about $400. If, however, the employer is in a three story building without an elevator, providing access could be expensive. Elevator installation could run as high as $20,000. That’s a great deal of expense, and would be considered undue hardship for a small employer.
When the building undergoes renovation, though, an elevator will have to be installed to meet ADA guidelines. One of the tenets of the ADA is that all renovations of older buildings and all new construction must make reasonable accommodations for disabled employees. That usually means elevators, wheelchair ramps, elevators, wider doorways, etc.
Before ADA was enacted, employers had no legal obligation to make adjustments for disabled employees. Government agencies and private businesses were allowed to design and build barriers that made workplaces inaccessible to the disabled. Even a small thing such as a curb could prevent a disabled person from entering a building. Wheelchair ramps on curb corners didn’t exist. All of them resulted from the passage of the ADA.
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