Opinion ID: 1658400
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Reasonable Accommodation Requirement.

Text: Our conclusion that American Freight has adequately established its nature of the occupation defense does not necessarily mean it may avoid the effect of its refusal to hire Frank. An employer must make a reasonable accommodation for a disability, unless it would be an undue hardship to do so. See Foods, Inc., 318 N.W.2d at 167. Frank eschews any need to consider the reasonable accommodation concept, because he claims American Freight failed to establish a legitimate basis for refusing his employment application. He needs no special accommodation by American Freight, he claims, because he can do the job without it. Because of our holding that American Freight did sustain its burden of showing a reasonable business necessity for its rule, however, we must address the impact of the reasonable accommodation rule. In the analogous area of religious discrimination, we have held that reasonable accommodation must be made by an employer only if it does not substantially impinge on the rights of other employees or incur more than a de minimus cost to the employer. King, 334 N.W.2d at 334 (citing TransWorld Airlines, Inc. v. Hardison, 432 U.S. 63, 83-84, 97 S.Ct. 2264, 2276-77, 53 L.Ed.2d 113, 130-31 (1977)). While Frank argues that no accommodation need be made for him because he is presently able to do the job, we believe American Freight is justified in looking ahead to the situation, which the medical evidence shows to be probable, in which Frank will not be able to do the job. In that situation, other employees would be required to fill in for him. Frank's team driver might be required to do all of the heavy work, including the loading and lifting. To hold, as the district court did, that this would be a reasonable accommodation, we believe was erroneous. It would almost certainly slow down the loading and unloading process. It is very possible, as American Freight points out, that an able-bodied teammate could not complete the loading or unloading immediately because of federal requirements for drivers to have a certain minimum number of hours of sleep. There would therefore be times when neither driver could load or unload, and as the evidence showed, it is not always possible to hire outsiders to do such work. We conclude that, to require this employer to make such accommodation as would be necessary under these conditions, would be unreasonable. See TransWorld Airlines, Inc., 432 U.S. at 83-84, 97 S.Ct. at 2276-77, 53 L.Ed.2d at 130-31. We believe that the district court erred in entering judgment in favor of Frank. We therefore reverse and remand for entry of an order dismissing the petition. REVERSED AND REMANDED.