On Friday, February 9, 2018, NELA joined AARP and AARP Foundation Litigation in filing an amicus brief in support of Plaintiff-Appellant Sharon Reagan-Diaz in Reagan-Diaz v. Sessions, pending currently in U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. After Ms. Reagan-Diaz suffered a serious workplace injury, she sought a reasonable accommodation from her employer, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under the Rehabilitation Act, while she also was receiving benefits under the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act (FECA). The Bureau refused, however, to engage in the interactive process with Ms. Reagan-Diaz, in part because it alleged that FECA’s procedures effectively superseded the Rehabilitation Act’s requirements. In describing the different functions and purposes served by the two statutes, our brief argues that 1) receiving benefits under FECA does not prevent a worker from receiving a salary for work actually performed; and 2) following FECA’s procedures does not obviate the requirement that a federal employer engage in a good-faith, interactive process with an employee seeking reasonable accommodation under the Rehabilitation Act. The brief was authored by NELA member Dara S. Smith (AARP Foundation Litigation, Washington, DC).#Amicus#DCCircuit#PublicEmployees#FederalEmployees