Opinion ID: 1822704
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: restatement of the facts

Text: ¶ 92. As an initial matter, I must highlight the central factual matter at issue in this case: what responsibilities of Catlin's job could she perform after an injury confined her to a wheelchair, and what duties could she not perform, even with reasonable accommodations? ¶ 93. Catlin's job was lead worker/supervisor of Crystal Lake Cheese Factory's wholesale department. As the supervisor of this four-person department, Catlin's job required her to perform a variety of duties. ¶ 94. The majority has adopted LIRC's findings as to Catlin's ability to perform adequately most of her job duties following her accident. LIRC concluded that, as of the date she sought reinstatement, Catlin could (1) train employees; (2) make boxes; (3) make labels; (4) bake cheese; (5) label cheese (if she used a reacher to get at the labels); (6) weigh cheese; (7) price cheese; (8) box cheese; (9) put the cheese on pallets; (10) do inventory and other paperwork; and (11) clean up and wash equipment. Catlin's testimony during the hearings before the ALJ supports LIRC's findings that Catlin could, as a purely quantitative matter, perform these tasks. ¶ 95. There also is a nontrivial number of duties that LIRC foundand which Catlin has admitted that she could not perform. Catlin could not perform some of the heavier physical tasks, including (1) lifting 40-pound blocks of cheese; (2) loading and unloading cheese onto hand carts and semi trucks; (3) reaching boxes stacked high in the storeroom; (4) reaching cheese stacked high in the cooler; (5) cutting cheese; and (6) placing the cheese in the hot-water bath to shrink-wrap it. LIRC proclaimed that the last two duties were not ones that Catlin performed very frequently, as they were primarily the jobs of the cheese cutter and cryovacer. Conspicuously absent from either of LIRC's lists is the vacuum-bagging role of the cryovacer, which involves the operation of a cryovac machine. In addition, prior to her accident Catlin had assisted in moving cheese by use of a handcart and loading it on a pickup truck to go to the retail store. [1] After her accident, Catlin was unable to perform either of these two functions as well. ¶ 96. In all, there is no disagreement between the parties or their respective experts that Catlin was physically unable to perform a fair number of her job duties, even with reasonable accommodations. ¶ 97. In determining whether Catlin could undertake her job responsibilities adequately, it appears that LIRC took mostly a quantitative approach. LIRC simply counted the number of duties Catlin could perform, added to this number those duties that she could perform with accommodation, and then compared this total to the number of jobs that she could not perform. Accordingly, it determined that Catlin could perform most of her job functions. This analytical technique is suspect, because it fails to account for the amount of time that Catlin spent daily on each of the jobs and the relative importance of each of the tasks that she was required to perform. Rather than engaging in such an analysis of assigning weight to Catlin's job requirements, LIRC slapped the ambiguous modifier most on the number of duties that she could still do and concluded that the duties she could not do anymore were those that she had performed not very frequently. ¶ 98. There is mostly ambiguous testimony regarding how often and for what length of time Catlin engaged in any of her duties. As a result, it is difficult to determine how the performance of each of these tasks relates to Catlin's ability to adequately perform the functions that are necessary to her position. [2] However, we do know the amount of time that she spent on one of her tasks; we know that she only spent about one to one-and-a-half hours at the beginning of her day handling her general paperwork and administrative duties. According to the modifications recommendation of Catlin's expert, however, these paperwork duties would have constituted the majority of Catlin's job upon her accommodation. [3] ¶ 99. In any event, Catlin and several other witnesses testified that one of the primary responsibilities of the four employees in this department was to undertake the jobs of the other three employees in the event of a temporary absence or if another employee were falling behind and needed help. For example, Catlin testified that she often jumped in to take 40-pound blocks of cheese to and from the cooler and that some days she would do this a couple of times a day. This task required her not only to lift the blocks but also to reach to the higher shelves in the cooler. Naturally, the ability of these four employees to work together and to work smoothly by filling in when needed was essential to the efficiency of the department's production process. In all, Catlin assisted with all the duties of the wholesale department on a daily basis and many of these duties she could no longer perform after her accident. ¶ 100. Nevertheless, LIRC concluded that Catlin could be assigned to performing all but the heaviest physical tasks in a department where such tasks are commonplace and where all employees, including Catlin, were required to perform each other's duties on a daily basis. Of course, LIRC's conclusion is based on a different view of the facts than that of the ALJ who first heard this case. Of particular concern is the difference between how the ALJ and LIRC characterized the frequency by which Catlin assisted other members of the department, including help with the heavy physical tasks. The ALJ concluded in his findings of fact that each employee in the department  regularly had to assist each other to keep work flowing smoothly and cover for each other when temporary absences occurred. Meanwhile, LIRC concluded that the duties which Catlin could not perform were tasks that she did not do very frequently and were those that she helped out only occasionally. Well, which is it?