Keith Powers v. Usf Holland, Incorp

667 F.3d 815, 25 Am. Disabilities Cas. (BNA) 931, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 24865, 2011 WL 6287918
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedDecember 15, 2011
Docket10-2363
StatusPublished
Cited by54 cases

This text of 667 F.3d 815 (Keith Powers v. Usf Holland, Incorp) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Keith Powers v. Usf Holland, Incorp, 667 F.3d 815, 25 Am. Disabilities Cas. (BNA) 931, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 24865, 2011 WL 6287918 (7th Cir. 2011).

Opinion

MANION, Circuit Judge.

Keith Powers injured his back while working for USF Holland, Inc., but following a worker’s compensation leave, he successfully returned to work as a long-haul truck driver and worked without incident for two years. As the birth of his child neared, Powers asked to switch from his long-haul driver assignment to a city driver route. After the switch, Powers began having problems with his back and asked to switch back, but the collective bargaining agreement did not allow for another change within a year, so Holland denied Powers’s request. Powers then took a medical leave of absence, but later sought to return to work, again as a long-haul driver, presenting Holland with a medical release which limited him to “road driver work” and “limited dock work.” Holland would not allow Powers to return, saying both that it needed clarification on his medical restrictions and that he could not return to work as a truck driver unless he received a medical release without restrictions.

Powers then sued Holland, alleging Holland violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by enforcing a 100% healed policy, *817 by discriminating against him, and by failing to provide him with a reasonable accommodation. Specifically, Powers claimed that he is disabled because his back injury rendered him substantially limited in the major life activity of working. In addition, he claimed that Holland discriminated against him and refused to accommodate his disability by refusing to allow him to return to work as a long-haul road driver with certain medical restrictions. The district court granted Holland summary judgment and Powers appeals.

We conclude that Powers is not substantially limited in the major life activity of working because he is capable of long-haul driving. At most, the record merely shows that Powers is unable to work as a city driver because it involves short hauls and dock work that requires him to frequently load and unload cargo using a forklift or other lift mechanisms. Therefore, Powers is not disabled within the meaning of the ADA, and accordingly his claims cannot succeed. We affirm.

I.

Powers began working in the spring of 1999 as a truck driver for Holland. Holland is a freight transportation company which operates terminals throughout the United States, including the one in South Bend, Indiana, where Powers worked. Drivers working out of Holland’s South Bend terminal are classified as either city drivers or road drivers. City drivers make short hauls and remain within a one-hundred-mile radius of the South Bend terminal and also perform dock work, primarily the loading of freight into and out of the trucks with a forklift. Road drivers make long hauls and may also load and unload freight. However, since they drive longer distances across state lines, they spend most of their time driving and have substantially less dock work.

In January 2002, Powers injured his back after driving a company truck over a rough patch of road. He was off work and received worker’s compensation benefits for about five months before Holland required him to submit to an independent medical examination. Dr. Marshall Matz examined Powers and concluded that he was “capable of resuming his usual gainful employment activity without limitations or restriction.” Based on Dr. Matz’s assessment of Powers, Holland ceased Powers’s worker’s compensation benefits effective May 23, 2002.

Powers returned to work as a road driver in June 2002 and worked for two years without issue. But in March 2004, Powers requested a switch to a city driver position because his wife was pregnant and due to give birth in August, and because his ailing father needed help with his farming business. Holland granted Powers’s request to work as a city driver. After the switch, Powers experienced difficulty sitting in and getting in and out of the forklift to do the substantial dock work required of city drivers. As a result, he had problems getting out of bed and bending over. Only one month after making the switch, Powers asked to be placed back in the road driver position. But under the governing collective bargaining agreement, drivers were only allowed one transfer per twelvemonth period and accordingly Holland denied Powers’s request.

In August 2004, Powers’s supervisor reprimanded him for working slowly and after Powers explained that he was working as fast as he could with his back bothering him, Powers was told he would be subject to disciplinary action if he continued to work while experiencing pain. Powers left work that day and on August 29, 2004, Powers’s physician, Dr. Magill, recommended that Powers discontinue work until further notice. Holland then *818 placed Powers on unpaid medical leave. A year and a half later, on December 12, 2005, Powers showed up at the Holland South Bend terminal and requested to return to work. He brought with him a release obtained from Dr. Magill, which provided that Powers could return to work on January 3, 2006, with the following restrictions: “(1) limit hours of dock work; (2) avoid dock plates as much as possible; (3) tractor needs to be supplied with air seat, suspension, cab, and (4) road driver work only.” Powers acknowledged that he helped Dr. Magill write these restrictions.

The supervisor on duty when Powers arrived at the South Bend terminal sent him to the Wipperman Occupational Health center for a return to work and fitness for duty examination, where on December 13, 2005, Dr. Bergin evaluated Powers. Dr. Bergin told Powers that she needed to review his medical records, but before she received the records, Holland’s Human Resources Manager, Stacey VandeVusse, learned of Powers’s request to return to work and reviewed the restrictions noted by Dr. Magill. VandeVusse told Dr. Bergin that the return-to-work physical was premature. According to Dr. Bergin, she also indicated that Powers could not return to work until he was released without restrictions. On December 21, 2005, Kurt Kopczynski, the South Bend Terminal Manager, also relayed to Powers Holland’s position that he would not be able to return to work with restrictions.

VandeVusse later contacted Powers and told him that Holland needed additional information on the restrictions. Specifically, VandeVusse noted that all drivers performed dock work and that Holland needed clarification concerning what “limited hours of dock work” meant, especially in light of its apparent conflict with the statement “road driver work only.” Vande-Vusse then asked Powers to complete a “Request for Accommodation” form and to return it to her by February 2006. She also provided a job analysis worksheet for the city driver position.

On January 30, 2006, Powers wrote to VandeVusse, informing her that his physician’s office “does not do that type of examination,” and that if Holland required him to have a physician complete the “Request for Accommodation” form, it would have to schedule and pay for the medical examination and pay Powers his current hourly wage rate for the time spent attending the medical examination. Powers also requested additional time to submit the required paperwork. In response, VandeVusse told Powers that he could have another month to complete the paperwork and explained that he did not need another examination — he simply needed to have his physician provide clarification regarding the limitations by completing the form.

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667 F.3d 815, 25 Am. Disabilities Cas. (BNA) 931, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 24865, 2011 WL 6287918, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/keith-powers-v-usf-holland-incorp-ca7-2011.