In conjunction with the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund and private civil rights law firm Fox and Roberts, we filed an amicus brief yesterday in Guthrey v. AltaCalifornia Regional Center, a case before the 9th Circuit that will decide whether regional centers and their vendors are subject to the anti-discrimination provisions of the ADA. We filed it on behalf of nonprofit organizations that serve people with intellectual and developmental disabilities statewide.
Regional centers are nonprofit private corporations that contract with the Department of Developmental Services to provide or coordinate services and supports for individuals with developmental disabilities throughout the State of California.
In Guthrey, a woman with developmental disabilities and her mother/conservator sued Alta California Regional Center and two of its vendors alleging discrimination in violation of Title III of the ADA, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act. The district court for the EasternDistrict of California dismissed the complaint, holding that Regional Centersand their vendors are not subject to Title III because their services are provided off-site, and not in their physical offices. The district court also held that because Guthrey could not establish a viable violation of Title IIIof the ADA, her Section 504 and Unruh Act claims necessarily failed.
The district court’s ruling was full of legal errors. If the Ninth Circuit upholds it, this case could have an enormous detrimental impact on hundreds of thousands of regional center clients throughout the state.
The brief—filed on behalf of neither party but rather on behalf of the nonprofits and their constituents – asks the court to reverse the ruling. We argue that the ADA does not require covered services to be provided on the physical premises of a covered business. Such an interpretation radically limits the ability of the ADA to address disability discrimination, contrary to Congressional intent. The brief also challenges the district court’s holding that showing an ADA violation is a prerequisite for raising claims under Section 504 and the Unruh Act. The ADA, the Rehab Act and the Unruh Act are all civil rights statutes that protect people with disabilities, but they are targeted at different kinds of businesses and agencies.
Our brief concludes that the errors in the district court’s order, if allowed to stand, will have a devastating impact on individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities in California who rely on services and supports delivered by regional centers and their vendors in the field to ensure their full and equal access to and participation in the community.
We are grateful to DREDF and the other organizations that joined the brief: The Arc of the United States; Autistic Self Advocacy Network; Autistic Women & Nonbinary Network; The Coelho Center for Disability Law, Policy and Innovation; Disability Rights Advocates; Disability Rights California; Disability Rights Legal Center; Disability Law United; Disability Voices United; National Disability Rights Network; and Youth Justice Education Clinic. Thank you for trusting us to get your important message before the court, to try and prevent a disastrous rollback of disability rights. We’re also proud of our attorney Deborah Gettleman, who raised the issue and organized the response.
See the Briefhere: https://dredf.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/2024.07.11-Guthrey-Amicus-FINAL-Accessible.pdf
See DREDF’sstatement about the case here: https://dredf.org/2024/07/12/dredf-urges-ninth-circuit-to-reverse-district-court-order-finding-regional-centers-and-their-vendors-not-covered-by-the-ada/