DOJ: Pennsylvania School Must Pay $700,000 to Student Denied Admission Because He's HIV-Positive

[MNBrewer]

"Today, the DOJ announced a settlement in the case:

Under the settlement agreement, the school is required to pay $700,000 to Smith and his mother, adopt and enforce a policy prohibiting discrimination and requiring equal opportunity for students with disabilities, including those with HIV, in the school’s programs and services, and to provide training to staff and administrators on the requirements of the ADA. The school must also pay a $15,000 civil penalty to the United States."

http://www.towleroad.com/2012/09/doj-pennsylvania-school-must-pay-700000-to-student-denied-admission-because-hes-hiv-positive.html

[William769]

1. Highly recommended.

[MNBrewer]

2. Maybe i'm wrong, but this outcome was totally predictable

[William769]

3. Under this Administration it was totally predictable.

Under the party of bigots, not so predictable.

[MNBrewer]

5. I think even under a Republican administration, the law would be pretty clear.

[closeupready]

4. Excellent. 100% support this.

K&R

[Fearless]

6. Good!

[Rkeytech]

7. This is just like Domestic Partnership...We get are rights sub par to equality

This ruling was because of ADA as an Architect I am well aware of the Americans With Disability Act. It has nothing to do with partisanship, it has been a law since 1991. It is unfortunate that Gay rights has to be worked in sneaky side alley means instead of being given equal access. Even thought this is an ADA ruling, its also part homophobia as linked by the perception of HIV being a wholly gay disease. While a healthy fear of deadly diseases is good, incorporating unwarranted fears and subsequent discrimination as an association with , "the gays" is typical of the American ignorance and their puritanical exclusion of the natural occurrence of homosexuality in nature. Its directed by the religious right. When we compare the civil rights of gays today to the blacks in the 50's it is a holistic comparison, because it is not a choice. This ruling is good, and perhaps if the Federal government were wise it would add sexual orientation to the 1964 legislature, so we could have the opportunity to bankrupt those that would wield this kind of ugly hate. I like to take the money from such litigation and use it to educate people that purport this hate about tolerance, the very fundamental principle that holds our pluralistic system together, and what is at the heart of that word "Liberty" that those same people throw around, but seem to think it to exclusionary and only to their kind. Perhaps if people understood our system instead of abusing their "freedoms" we could be the great America we say we are, until then divided we fall and decline.

[MNBrewer]

8. Welcome to DU.

TO be honest, I never thought of this as a gay issue, but as an HIV issue.