Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. will pay $50,000 to settle U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charges that a store in Olathe, Kansas, violated the Americans with Disabilities Act when it refused to allow a worker to use her service dog as a reasonable accommodation.
The worker, who needed the dog to help with anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, was a cashier at the store and also assisted with stocking shelves. She put in her request to use the dog as an accommodation and submitted medical documentation, but the store’s district manager and HR leaders decided the dog would present a safety issue — even though customers were allowed to bring service dogs and pet dogs to the store, EEOC alleged.
In addition to paying $50,000 in monetary damages to the former worker, a three-year consent decree will require Hobby Lobby to provide employees with ADA training, amend its policies to allow service dogs as reasonable accommodations and notify employees of their right to reasonable accommodations under the ADA. It must also periodically report to the agency.
Employers sometimes run afoul of the law when they outright reject the use of service animals without a strong justification or without engaging in an interactive process. The EEOC brought similar charges against a Papa Johns location in Athens, Georgia, in March after a worker’s service dog was rejected over “health and safety” concerns, even though the dog would have been separated from food preparation.
“Allowing service animals into the workplace enables qualified workers to provide for themselves and their families and to productively contribute to their communities and the economy. And, with rare exceptions, it is the law,” Andrea G. Baran, regional attorney for the EEOC’s St. Louis district office, said in an EEOC press release on the news.
“Employers cannot reject service animals, or any other reasonable accommodation, based on unfounded assumptions regarding safety,” David Davis, acting director of the EEOC’s St. Louis office, echoed in the same release.
