Can Fido Come To Work? EEOC Files Suit To Require Emotional Support Dog On Truck Route

It's true. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is taking the position that an emotional support animal may be a required reasonable accommodation in the workplace. In January, we explained that federal (and most states') public accommodation laws do not require businesses and organizations to accommodate disabled individuals with regard to their requested use of emotional support dogs or other animals. Some state laws and city ordinances even make it a crime to try to pass off an emotional support dog or pet as a legally-protected, disability-related service animal. And, while it requires accommodating a true service animal (defined as "any dog that is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability"), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) expressly excludes emotional support dogs from the protections granted in Title III, which regulates public accommodations and their obligations to customers, guests, patients, patrons, clients, etc.

However, Title I of the ADA—which prohibits disability discrimination in the employment context and affirmatively requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations to applicants and employees—is completely silent with regard to service dogs and other animals as examples of appropriate accommodations. Even an EEOC resource document recently released in December 2016 as guidance for workplace accommodation of employees' mental health conditions fails to mention the use or need for emotional support or service animals. Nevertheless, we have long suspected that the EEOC would take the position that a service animal—and even an emotional support animal—might be a reasonable accommodation in the employment context, depending on the circumstances.

Now our suspicion has been confirmed. In what may be the first lawsuit of its kind, earlier this month, the EEOC filed a complaint in a Florida federal court against a trucking company claiming that the employer wrongfully failed to accommodate a truck driver's request to have his dog with him as he drives his trucking routes (EEOC v. CRST Int'l, Inc., filed March 2, 2017). Unlike some service dogs that perform physical tasks for disabled individuals with vision, hearing, mobility, and other impairments, the dog in this case admittedly provides only emotional support for its owner Leon Laferriere's post-traumatic stress disorder and mood disorder.

According to the lawsuit, Laferriere's...