Whether her disability meant she couldn't do the job is debatable. My cousin is deaf from birth and, as a result, can be slightly difficult to understand, but not any more so than someone with a moderate accent. Her ability to read lips is amazing, and she can decipher what people are saying from across the room. She uses sign language, but only with other people who use sign language. She doesn't need it with the rest of us.

If this woman's only limitation was that she needed to be looking at a customer in order to understand him, then there was no reason to not at least give her a chance on the register.

Right now we only have one side of the story. I'd like to hear the other side.

> "Employers with 15 or more employees must comply with the ADA,"

Gee, what could POSSIBLY be the side effect of such a wonderful law?

I note that in France there's a HUGE spike in companies with 49 employees.

Pure coincidence, I guess, that all sorts of extra onerous mandates apply to firms with 50 employees.

So France's firms don't want to grow and hire?

That's OK, they've got a stunningly low unemployment rate, right?

Right?

"If this woman's only limitation was that she needed to be looking at a customer in order to understand him, then there was no reason to not at least give her a chance on the register."

Perhaps, perhaps not.

The employer is the one who stands to lose customers if the cashier doesn't work out. We are not talking big business here. Look at the place! If they have 15 employees, it must be because a lot are part-time.

If the owner thinks someone isn't suited to work with customers, that decision ought to be final. It's their business and reputation on the line.

The EEOC press release makes it sound like the owner has seen the light. In fact, the owner paid $20,000 to make the EEOC go away, because any other course of action would have been far more expensive. This is called extortion, you know the type: "Nice little café you have there; be a shame if anything happened to it."

Put yourself in the shoes of the employer: You hired a mildly handicapped person. When they don't get their way, they call down the EEOC on you, costing you a lot of nerves plus $20,000 cash. What lesson have you learned? Never hire the handicapped! That is the real lesson taught by the EEOC and the ADA.

Heck, she doesn't even need to be completely deaf to be on the books as hearing impaired. My cousin is only deaf in one ear. She's on the books as handicapped, but she would have no problems at all working a register.

At this point we don't know whether this lady's handicap was severe enough to make her unsuitable for the position or if her employer really was discriminating against her due to a fairly minor handicap.

@Dave: Having some ties to Albuquerque, I spent some time trying to research this case. The employee's name is Laura Mitchell, and the initial articles about the EEOC suit being filed are dated September 2011. Ms. Mitchell's story is nowhere to be found; the only information seems to come from the EEOC. Their story is that Ms. Mitchell was hired to bus tables and wash dishes. When she asked to move up to a customer-facing position and was refused, based on misconceptions about her handicap.

Most likely she asked "why" she couldn't move to a better job in the bakery, and the manager made the mistake of saying "because you don't hear well", instead of something non-committal and non-prosecutable. The reason for this interpretation is the allegation in the EEOC comments that the refusal was based a misconception about her handicap.

In fact, hearing-impaired people can interact well with non-hearing-impaired. However, this depends on their individual situation and capabilities. I have relatives who are deaf, or nearly so. One of them reads lips so well that you would never know there is a problem. A different relative can't, so he tries to fake it, and gets it wrong nearly every time. The first could work with customers (and does); the other would be a disaster.

The question is: who is the best judge of Ms. Mitchell's individual suitability for a particular job? Seems to me that would be the employer who has seen her working. As I said above, it is the owner's business on the line, so it ought to be the owner's decision.

By the way, in addition to the settlement, the café is also required to offer Ms. Mitchell a job working with customers. That ought to do wonders for the team spirit in a small business!

"If this woman's only limitation was that she needed to be looking at a customer in order to understand him, then there was no reason to not at least give her a chance on the register"

Hmm was just thinking of some stores by my corner, an "international" butchers shop at which I'd say 1/4 of the customers wear hijabs. How do you not discriminate against customers who have their face covered by hijabs if you read lips? Not saying this place does, but it would be the store managers choice. Either way the store, will face a suit, byt the hearing impared or by the religiously dressed.
A no win situation.

Also how many customer complaints about this person, before the store manager gets his money back?

"how many customer complaints about this person, before the store manager gets his money back?"

This. The EEOC has no skin in the game. If they turn out to be right, all is well. If they turn out to be wrong, who cares? They are already off prosecuting the next small business.

"The EEOC has no skin in the game."
Actually they do, but in the bad way. If no one ever complains or sues of discrimination the EEOC might lose their funding.
The EEOC must show they are doing something, which to them is upping the number of lawsuits and complaints filed to them. Frivolous or not a win or a complaint is what they need.

The other result for the employer is if there are complaints and lost customers due to this employee, the employer will be afraid to fire or demote this person, since that would trigger another lawsuit, with lawyer costs, fines, and bad press.

At this point we don't know whether this lady's handicap was severe enough to make her unsuitable for the position or if her employer really was discriminating against her due to a fairly minor handicap.

Agreed. I'd really like to know more about how severe her handicap is. If the store owner was just being a dick, I have a lot less sympathy. But if she really can't do the job, then she shouldn't be.

"If the store owner was just being a dick" MonicaP

here's the thing... do you really want a massive govt. arm with lawyers, technocrats, etc. prosecuting an issue where maybe the boss is a jerk? The small business lost a lot here, I'd imagine the cost of the investigation ran in to 6 figures...

and now the business is stuck, because they can never fire her, unless they have a really good case.

My guess is a_random_guy is exactly right, where the boss said something they shouldn'a EVEN IF IT WAS TRUE and that's where all this came from.

Yeah, we DON'T know the whole story.

It's ONLY a story for us because out govt. is spending a stunning amount of money to swat a gnat with a backhoe.

Her manager knows her. If she'd make a perfectly competent cashier, and his business needs those, he'd promote her.

Actually, we do have enough info from the EEOC.

a provision requiring an employment offer to Mitchell into a vacant salad station or sandwich station position;

Not cashier.

So even the EEOC settlement/extortion admits that she wasn't suited to being a cashier.

Here's what I don't understand. An employer has the right not to hire someone if he doesn't want to. And he doesn't have to give the reason, either.

So, who told this deaf person that she was being discriminated against because she was deaf? Without proof positive that her hearing impairment was the cause, she shouldn't have a case to begin with.

If they say he has to comply with hiring practices, I would hire someone else with a handicap. "Sorry, position filled. Good luck."

The ADA has done a lot of good, but oh, the stories I could tell about ridiculous claims by employees, and the ridiculous positions taken by government agencies...

The idea behind the ADA was good -- give the handicapped and disabled the opportunity to mix with the rest of society with reasonable accommodation.

Reasonable accommodation:
Put a generally shallow ramp that most wheelchairs can get up.
Unreasonable accommodation:
Because the slope of the ramp is 1° high because of property boundaries.
Reasonable accommodation:
The bathrooms can accommodate a person in a wheelchair so a person can take a dump.
Unreasonable accommodation:
I can't comb my hair because the mirror is two inches too high.
Reasonable accommodation:
Put a ramp in so wheelchair customers can enter the store.
Unreasonable accommodation:
It is discriminatory to put the ramp at the rear of the store. This is the same village store that sits on the sidewalk and has only 48" to the road and would be in violation of the ADA for putting the ramp out front.

There are many stories like this.

The same crap happens with EEOC.