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57 FLRA No. 51
U.S. Dept. of Justice, INS and AFGE, Immigration and Naturalization Service Council (Angelo, Arbitrator), 0-AR-3388 (Decided June 7, 2001)
The Arbitrator sustained in part a grievance alleging, as relevant here, that the Agency discriminated against certain immigration inspectors when it terminated and/or placed them in an inactive duty status for failing to complete firearms training. For the reasons that follow, we deny the Agency's exception.The Agency argued that the award was contrary to the ADA. However, because the ADA is not applicable to Federal employees, and because the standards of the ADA have been incorporated into the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C. § 791, the Authority construed this argument as a claim that the award was contrary to the Rehabilitation Act.
The Rehabilitation Act prohibits Federal agencies from discriminating against qualified handicapped employees and imposes a duty to make reasonable accommodations for such employees unless an agency can show that to do so would impose undue hardship on its operations. An employee is not entitled to a reasonable accommodation unless that employee qualifies as a handicapped person under the Rehabilitation Act.
The Authority found, contrary to the Agency's claim, that the Arbitrator did not order the Agency to provide any particular inspectors with a reasonable accommodation. Under the award, the Agency is required only to consider whether those inspectors identified by the Union could be entitled to a reasonable accommodation, and if so, to provide such an accommodation. As nothing in the award indicated that the Arbitrator found that any of the inspectors at issue qualified as handicapped persons under the Rehabilitation Act and were entitled to a reasonable accommodation, the Agency's exception did not provide a basis for finding the award deficient.