Altering Facilities As Accommodation

Many individuals with disabilities may have difficulty performing a particular job because of the physical configuration and structure of the work site. In order for an employer to fulfill its accommodation obligation under the ADA, the EEOC has stated that an employer may be required to make its existing facilities ''readily accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities.'' Such accommodations could include, for example, redesigning an employee's work station to accommodate a person in a wheelchair or removing barriers within an office environment to allow for an unimpeded path from the entry way to the area where the employee works. Examples of other types of physical accommodations include: - Installing ramps by stairways; - Installing handrails in restrooms and making restrooms fully accessible to persons in wheelchairs; - Widening doorways and installing automatic doors; - Rearranging files or shelves in a work area so that they can be reached by an individual in a wheelchair; - Using blocks to raise the legs of a desk to accommodate a wheelchair; - Installing adaptive levers on machinery in place of buttons so that the machinery can be operated by persons who are quadriplegic; - Installing an indicator light in a timer on laboratory test equipment to allow a deaf medical technician to operate the equipment; - Installing a light probe on a telephone console to allow a visually impaired receptionist to determine which lines on a telephone are ringing, on hold, or in use; - Installing a headset on a telephone to allow a salesperson with cerebral palsy to write while talking; - Installing raised door numbers for the blind; - Installing alternative warning devices for the deaf and blind; and - Eliminating heat activated elevator buttons and replacing them with buttons that a person with artificial limbs can operate.