Connecticut Administrative Code › Title 31 - Labor › 51rr - Family and Medical Leave for School Paraprofessionals › Section 31-51rr-47 - Interaction with Federal and State anti-discrimination laws (29 CFR Section 825.702)

Current through July 10, 2024
(a) Nothing in FMLA
			 modifies or affects any Federal or State law prohibiting discrimination on the
			 basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, age, or disability, such
			 as under Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended by the
			 federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978, or any protected class under
			 CFEPA.
(b) If an employee is a
			 qualified individual with a disability within the meaning of the ADA or an
			 applicable state law, the employer must make reasonable accommodations, barring
			 undue hardship, in accordance with the ADA or applicable state law. At the same
			 time, the employer must afford an employee his or her FMLA rights. ADA's
			 "disability" and FMLA's "serious health condition" are different concepts, and
			 must be analyzed separately. FMLA entitles eligible employees to twelve (12)
			 weeks of leave in any twelve (12)-month period due to their own serious health
			 condition, whereas the ADA allows an indeterminate amount of leave, barring
			 undue hardship, as a reasonable accommodation. FMLA requires employers to
			 maintain employees' group health plan coverage during FMLA leave on the same
			 conditions as coverage would have been provided if the employee had been
			 continuously employed during the leave period, whereas ADA does not require
			 maintenance of health insurance unless other employees receive health insurance
			 during leave under the same circumstances.
(c)
(1) A
			 reasonable accommodation under the ADA or applicable state law might be
			 accomplished by providing an individual with a disability with a part-time job
			 with no health benefits, assuming the employer did not ordinarily provide
			 health insurance for part-time employees. However, FMLA would permit an
			 employee to work a reduced leave schedule until the equivalent of twelve (12)
			 workweeks of leave were used, with group health benefits maintained during this
			 period. FMLA permits an employer to temporarily transfer an employee who is
			 taking leave intermittently or on a reduced leave schedule for planned medical
			 treatment to an alternative position, whereas the ADA allows an accommodation
			 of reassignment to an equivalent, vacant position only if the employee cannot
			 perform the essential functions of the employee's present position and an
			 accommodation is not possible in the employee's present position, or an
			 accommodation in the employee's present position would cause an undue hardship.
			 The examples in the following subsections of this section demonstrate how the
			 two laws would interact with respect to a qualified individual with a
			 disability.
(2) A qualified
			 individual with a disability who is also an "eligible employee" entitled to
			 FMLA leave requests ten (10) weeks of medical leave as a reasonable
			 accommodation, which the employer grants because it is not an undue hardship.
			 The employer advises the employee that the ten (10) weeks of leave is also
			 being designated as FMLA leave and will count towards the employee's FMLA leave
			 entitlement. This designation does not prevent the parties from also treating
			 the leave as a reasonable accommodation and reinstating the employee into the
			 same job, as required by the ADA, rather than an equivalent position under
			 FMLA, if that is the greater right available to the employee. At the same time,
			 the employee would be entitled under FMLA to have the employer maintain group
			 health plan coverage during the leave, as that requirement provides the greater
			 right to the employee.
(3) If the
			 same employee needed to work part-time on a reduced leave schedule after
			 returning to his or her same job, the employee would still be entitled under
			 FMLA to have group health plan coverage maintained for the remainder of the
			 two(2)-week equivalent of FMLA leave entitlement, notwithstanding an employer
			 policy that part-time employees do not receive health insurance. This employee
			 would be entitled under the ADA to reasonable accommodations to enable the
			 employee to perform the essential functions of the part-time position. In
			 addition, because the employee is working a part-time schedule as a reasonable
			 accommodation, the FMLA's provision for temporary assignment to a different
			 alternative position would not apply. Once the employee has exhausted his or
			 her remaining FMLA leave entitlement while working the reduced (part-time)
			 schedule, if the employee is a qualified individual with a disability, and if
			 the employee is unable to return to the same full-time position at that time,
			 the employee might continue to work part-time as a reasonable accommodation,
			 barring undue hardship; the employee would then be entitled to only those
			 employment benefits ordinarily provided by the employer to part-time
			 employees.
(4) At the end of the
			 FMLA leave entitlement, an employer is required under FMLA to reinstate the
			 employee in the same or an equivalent position, with equivalent pay and
			 benefits, to that which the employee held when leave commenced. The employer's
			 FMLA obligations would be satisfied if the employer offered the employee an
			 equivalent full-time position. If the employee were unable to perform the
			 essential functions of that equivalent position even with reasonable
			 accommodation, because of a disability, the ADA or an applicable state law may
			 require the employer to make a reasonable accommodation at that time by
			 allowing the employee to work part-time or by reassigning the employee to a
			 vacant position, barring undue hardship.