DISCUSSION OF CASE
by Amy Howe
on 7 January 2025
at 11:09
Justice will hear Stanley v. City of Sanford, Fla. on January 13 (Katie Barlow)
The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments next week in a dispute over whether a Florida woman who retired from her job as a firefighter can sue her former employer under the Americans with Disabilities Act alleging discrimination in how benefits are provided in the following years. she left her job.
Karyn Stanley, a retired firefighter, told the judges that a ruling for her former employer “would pull the rug out from under firefighters, police officers, teachers and others who become disabled through years of service to their communities and country.” The court’s decision here, she argues, will affect millions of people with disabilities who depend on retirement benefits.
But a “friend of the court” brief from a group representing local governments notes that employee compensation, including employee benefits, makes up a significant portion of a city or town’s budget. A ruling for the employee, they say, “could lead to a flood of litigation — and its costs — every time budgets are rebalanced.”
Stanley joined the Sanford, Fla. Fire Department. in 1999 and worked there for two decades before Parkinson’s disease forced her to retire. When Stanley started working as a firefighter, the city covered just over 75% of her monthly health insurance premium. The city told her it also gave the same subsidy until age 65 to employees who retired after 25 years on the job or because of a disability.
In 2003, the city changed its policy on insurance subsidies. Under the new policy, firefighters who retire after 25 years of service will continue to receive the grant until they turn 65. But firefighters who retire due to a disability will receive the grant for 24 months or until they becomes eligible for Medicare, whichever comes first.
Stanley was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2016. She went on disability pension two years later, at the age of 47. The change in the city’s subsidy policy meant that in 2020, Stanley became responsible for the entire cost of her health insurance for the next 15 years, until she turns 65 years.
Stanley went to federal court, claiming the city’s policy violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by discriminating against her based on her disability.
The trial court dismissed the case, and the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit upheld the dismissal. Because Stanley did not work for the City and did not want to work for the City when her retirement benefits were terminated, it held that she could not bring her claim under the ADA.
Stanley then went to the Supreme Court, which in June agreed to weigh in.
In her benefits brief, Stanley is pushing back against the 11th Circuit’s assertion that she can’t sue because she wasn’t working for the city when her retirement benefits were terminated. The ADA, she insists, is broad enough to allow lawsuits by “any person alleging discrimination” in violation of the law who “claims to be aggrieved.
The ADA also makes clear what can form the basis of a lawsuit, she continues. It prohibits discrimination in hiring and firing, as well as “compensation” and “terms, conditions and privileges of employment” — which, Stanley writes, the Supreme Court has “longest read to include post-employment benefits for which retirees can sue.”
Finally, she says the ADA states that a lawsuit can be brought either when an employer adopts a benefit policy “or when the plaintiff is ‘affected’ by it.” Therefore, she argues that she can prevail (and her lawsuit can proceed) even under the 11th Circuit’s rule because she was working for the city when it adopted the new policy in 2003.
The Biden administration filed a “friend of the court” letter in support of Stanley, agreeing that her lawsuit can proceed because Stanley was still working for the city when it made the policy change in 2003.
More generally, the Biden administration argues, the ADA also prohibits discrimination in benefits to former employees. “When an employer makes a discriminatory change in a plaintiff’s post-employment benefits,” writes US Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, “it retroactively changes the plaintiff’s terms of employment and alters the compensation she earned as an employee performing the essential functions of her job.” “
The municipality emphasizes that the only issue before the Supreme Court is whether a disabled former employee can bring suit under the ADA to challenge discrimination that occurs well after she leaves a job.
On that question, the municipality writes, the appeals court was right: The employee cannot, because the ADA only precludes discrimination against a person who can perform the job she currently holds or wants. The law, the city stresses, aims to protect people with disabilities “who are currently working, want to work and can work” from discrimination. Because Stanley could not show that the city discriminated against her while she was still on the job, the city concludes that her claim cannot proceed.
The city notes that the 11th Circuit rule does not bar all lawsuits from former employees: Retirees can still file lawsuits to challenge discrimination they experienced while working, it says. Furthermore, the city notes that a ruling in the city’s favor does not preclude any relief for someone like Stanley, as there are “several remedies under other federal and state laws” that may provide a remedy for post-employment discrimination.
Stanley, the city continues, is now making a separate argument to the judges — that she was the victim of discrimination while still working as a firefighter. But the court should not address that issue, the city insists, because Stanley acknowledged in the appeals court that she could not have had a legal standing to bring a discrimination claim while employed by the city and able to perform his work. Similarly, the City adds, to the extent that Stanley contends that she had a discrimination claim after she was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, but before she retired, she did not raise that argument in the lower court.
This article was originally published on Howe on the Court.
