Alaska Employment Law

The 9th Circuit has rejected the Rehab Act claim of a legal assistant at Oregon’s Public Defender agency, on the grounds that the agency was not a “program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, 29 U.S.C. § 794. 

Because the agency doesn’t directly receive federal funds, the assistant first relied on the agency’s relationship to its related entities (the Oregon court system).  After looking to state law to identify the agency’s relationship to the (federally-assisted) court system, the panel rejected that theory because the PD agency and the court system “have distinct funding sources and administrative apparatuses.”   For instance, the Chief Justice can remove court employees, but not PDs.

When the legal assistant then pointed to federal assistance that had subsidized her hiring (through a state voc rehab program), the panel held that “Section 504’s reach, however, encompasses a department or agency receiving federal funds in ‘only those periods during which the funds are accepted.’”  Because the federal wage subsidy had lapsed by the time of the claimed discrimination, the panel rejected that theory, as well.  

Sharer v. Oregon, ___ F.3d ___ (9th Cir. Sept. 21, 2009)