ENROLLED
Senate Bill No. 117
(By Senators Ross, Anderson, Plymale and Dalton)
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[Passed March 9, 1994; in effect from passage.]
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AN ACT to amend and reenact section three, article eleven,
chapter five of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine
hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to limiting those
rights, remedies and requirements relating to discrimination
by proprietors and others of penitentiaries, correctional
facilities, regional jails and county jails to employees of
such facilities, employees of law-enforcement agencies and
visitors to such facilities or employees; and including
domestic employees within the definition of employee
generally.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section three, article eleven, chapter five of the code
of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as
amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 11. HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION.
§5-11-3. Definitions.
When used in this article:
(a) The term "person" means one or more individuals,
partnerships, associations, organizations, corporations, labor
organizations, cooperatives, legal representatives, trustees,
trustees in bankruptcy, receivers and other organized groups of
persons;
(b) The term "commission" means the West Virginia human
rights commission;
(c) The term "director" means the executive director of the
commission;
(d) The term "employer" means the state, or any political
subdivision thereof, and any person employing twelve or more
persons within the state: Provided, That such terms shall not be
taken, understood or construed to include a private club;
(e) The term "employee" shall not include any individual
employed by his parents, spouse or child;
(f) The term "labor organization" includes any organization
which exists for the purpose, in whole or in part, for collective
bargaining or for dealing with employers concerning grievances,
terms or conditions of employment or for other mutual aid or
protection in relation to employment;
(g) The term "employment agency" includes any person
undertaking with or without compensation to procure, recruit,
refer or place employees. A newspaper engaged in the activity of
advertising in the normal course of its business shall not be
deemed to be an employment agency;
(h) The term "discriminate" or "discrimination" means toexclude from, or fail or refuse to extend to, a person equal
opportunities because of race, religion, color, national origin,
ancestry, sex, age, blindness, handicap or familial status and
includes to separate or segregate;
(i) The term "unlawful discriminatory practices" includes
only those practices specified in section nine of this article;
(j) The term "place of public accommodations" means any
establishment or person, as defined herein, including the state,
or any political or civil subdivision thereof, which offers its
services, goods, facilities or accommodations to the general
public, but shall not include any accommodations which are in
their nature private. To the extent that any penitentiary,
correctional facility, detention center, regional jail or county
jail is a place of public accommodation, the rights, remedies and
requirements provided by this article for any violation of
subdivision (6), section nine of this article shall not apply to
any person other than: (1) Any person employed at a
penitentiary, correctional facility, detention center, regional
jail or county jail; (2) any person employed by a law-enforcement
agency; or (3) any person visiting any such employee or visiting
any person detained in custody at such facility;
(k) The term "age" means the age of forty or above;
(l) For the purpose of this article, a person shall be
considered to be blind only if his central visual acuity does not
exceed twenty/two hundred in the better eye with correcting
lenses, or if his visual acuity is greater than twenty/twohundred but is occasioned by a limitation in the fields of vision
such that the widest diameter of the visual field subtends an
angle no greater than twenty degrees; and
(m) The term "handicap" means a person who:
(1) Has a mental or physical impairment which substantially
limits one or more of such person's major life activities. The
term "major life activities" includes functions such as caring
for one's self, performing manual tasks, walking, seeing,
hearing, speaking, breathing, learning and working;
(2) Has a record of such impairment; or
(3) Is regarded as having such an impairment.
For the purposes of this article, this term does not include
persons whose current use of or addiction to alcohol or drugs
prevents such individual from performing the duties of the job in
question or whose employment, by reason of such current alcohol
or drug abuse, would constitute a direct threat to property or
the safety of others.