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Mankins v. Paxton3/20/2001
* no qualified individual with a disability shall, by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination by any such entity.
We note first that the parties have raised the issue of the applicability of the United States Supreme Court's recent decision in Bd. of Trustees of the Univ. of Alabama v. Garrett (2001), U.S. , 121 S.Ct. 955, (2001 WL 173556). Garrett is not on point. Garrett addressed the issue of the Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution and suits against the state in federal court for money damages under the ADA. The case at bar is a claim under the ADA in state court, filed against the state for injunctive and declaratory relief. Hence, the holding in Garrett is inapplicable to the present case. In addition, we note that Garrett involved suits by state employees against the state of Alabama for money damages for the failure to comply with Title I of the ADA. The Supreme Court found such suits were barred by the Eleventh Amendment. It specifically declined to address the issue of whether Title II of the ADA (the provision at issue in the case at bar) was appropriate legislation under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Having found Garrett inapplicable to the case at bar, we now determine whether appellant's cause of action against the state under the ADA stated a claim upon which relief can be granted. Appellant does not specifically indicate in her complaint what her handicap was. We assume it was the injuries she incurred at work. The state contends that appellant was not excluded from participation in OWF "by reason of such disability," as is required in order to state a claim under the ADA. Rather, the state asserts that appellant's benefits were sanctioned because she failed to show good cause for her failure to work. The state argues that this standard is applied to everyone who participates in OWF regardless of any disability, and appellant has not asserted that her disability somehow prevented her from submitting a written medical statement.
The state's arguments in this regard are persuasive. However, the above is not the only wrongdoing averred in the complaint. The complaint also avers that the county defendants required her to work under OWF despite her disability and that the state wrongly denied her appeal and affirmed such actions without considering the circumstances "as a whole." Appellant contends, in essence, that from the beginning she should not have been required to work due to her disability. These acts could be prohibited under the ADA. Thus, appellant has stated a claim against the state for declaratory/injunctive relief under the ADA. Therefore, the trial court erred in dismissing appellant's fourth claim for relief against the state.
Appellant's fifth claim for relief asserts that the state violated Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. Section 794(a), Title 29, U.S.Code states:
No otherwise qualified individual with a disability in the United States, as defined in section 705(20) of this title, shall, solely by reason of her or his disability, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance *.
The state sets forth the same arguments against appellant's fifth claim that are asserted against appellant's ADA claim. Our analysis set forth above for appellant's ADA claim applies equally to appellant's claim under the Rehabilitation Act. Accordingly, we find appellant has stated a claim under the Rehabilitation Act against the stat
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