Worker’s Claim Revived Over Delay in Allowing Use of Service Dog

A Texas school district must face a human resources employee’s claim that a delay in granting permission for her to use a service dog at work violated disability bias law, the Fifth Circuit ruled Friday.

Aldine Independent School District ultimately approved Alisha Strife’s request following a six-month interactive process. At issue was whether the “delay, in and of itself, constitutes a failure to accommodate” her military-related mobility and mental health disabilities, the court said. The allegations in Strife’s lawsuit, which included that the district caused the delay by repeatedly insisting she undergo an unneeded medical exam, plausibly alleged failure-to-accommodate claims ...