Workplace Discrimination in Los Angeles: What to Know

If you are trying to work out whether what happened to you in a Los Angeles workplace was unlawful, the most useful thing to know is that California protects more than federal law does, and sets a lower bar in at least one important respect.

A claim that would fail under the ADA can still succeed under California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act. That is not an accident; the Legislature wrote the difference into the statute.

What is protected

The Civil Rights Department states that it is illegal for employers of five or more employees to discriminate against applicants and employees because of a protected category, or to retaliate against them for asserting their rights. The categories CRD lists:

Race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, creed, age (40 and over), disability (mental and physical), sex and gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, military or veteran status, and reproductive health decision-making.

One distinction worth holding onto: that five-employee threshold applies to discrimination and retaliation. Harassment is governed by a different rule — CRD states “Harassment is prohibited in all workplaces, even those with fewer than five employees.” A very small employer can be outside the discrimination provisions and still within the harassment ones.

Where California goes further

Government Code § 12926.1 is unusually direct about it. California disability law provides protections “independent from those in the federal Americans with Disabilities Act”; the federal act “provides a floor of protection”; and the Legislature intends “to require a ‘limitation’ rather than a ‘substantial limitation’ of a major life activity.”

FEHA then defines that threshold plainly: a condition “limits a major life activity if it makes the achievement of the major life activity difficult.” And whether it limits one is assessed “without regard to mitigating measures, such as medications, assistive devices, or reasonable accommodations, unless the mitigating measure itself limits a major life activity.”

There is also a one-way ratchet at § 12926(n): if the federal ADA definition would give broader protection in a particular case, the broader federal definition applies.

“Medical condition” is narrower than it sounds

A common misreading. Under FEHA, “medical condition” is not a general term for illness. It means “(1) Any health impairment related to or associated with a diagnosis of cancer or a record or history of cancer. (2) Genetic characteristics.” It is listed separately from physical and mental disability, and being told your condition “is not a disability” does not end the analysis.

Accommodation, and the duty to talk about it

Two separate obligations, and an employer can breach either.

Section 12940(m)(1) makes it unlawful “to fail to make reasonable accommodation for the known physical or mental disability of an applicant or employee.” Section 12940(n) separately makes it unlawful “to fail to engage in a timely, good faith, interactive process.”

CRD puts the practical point directly: “Whether or not the accommodation can be granted as requested, everyone must participate in the interactive process in good faith and in a way that does not delay the reasonable accommodation process.”

An employer that simply stopped responding after your accommodation request has a problem, even if the accommodation itself would have been difficult.

And asking is itself protected: § 12940(m)(2) prohibits retaliating against someone “for requesting accommodation under this subdivision, regardless of whether the request was granted.”

Proving it

Direct evidence is rare. What cases are built from: comparators treated differently for the same conduct; timing relative to a disclosure, request or diagnosis; shifting explanations between the meeting, the file and the unemployment response; departures from the employer’s own policy; and patterns affecting others in the same group.

Records can help you compare how similar situations were handled.

Where a Los Angeles case is filed

Los Angeles County employment cases can generally be filed in the Central District downtown at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse — see Los Angeles for where things are actually heard.