in Re hicks/brown Minors, 153786

Background

Respondent Brown, an individual with an intellectual disability, had two children taken into protective custody in 2012–2013; the court instituted a Department service plan and later a petition sought termination of parental rights.
Brown’s counsel repeatedly (beginning Jan 2014 and on multiple occasions through 2015) requested disability‑accommodating services through Neighborhood Service Organization (NSO); the court ordered the Department to assist in obtaining NSO services but the Department never provided them.
The Department petitioned to terminate Brown’s parental rights in June 2015; the Wayne Circuit Court found two statutory grounds for termination and concluded termination was in the children’s best interests, issuing the termination order in July 2015.
Brown appealed, arguing the Department failed to reasonably accommodate her disability under the ADA, and therefore failed to make the statutorily required reasonable reunification efforts under Michigan’s Probate Code.
The Court of Appeals held Brown preserved her challenge and found termination premature because the service plan lacked reasonable accommodations; the Michigan Supreme Court affirmed that reasonable‑efforts analysis must account for ADA accommodations, vacated aspects of the Court of Appeals’ mandated checklist, and remanded for further proceedings.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the Department must provide reasonable accommodations under the ADA as part of "reasonable efforts" to reunify before terminating parental rights	Brown: ADA requires reasonable modifications to ensure meaningful access; failure to accommodate means reunification efforts were not reasonable	Department: Denied timely objection and argued standard efforts sufficed; timeliness challenge (raised on appeal) that objections must be made when plan adopted or soon after	Held: ADA accommodations are part of reasonable‑efforts duty where Department knows of disability; remand to analyze whether Department reasonably accommodated Brown (who was known to be disabled)
Whether Brown timely preserved her disability‑based objection in the circuit court	Brown: Counsel raised the need for NSO services repeatedly before termination hearing, and court ordered assistance, so claim was preserved	Department: Relied on In re Terry to argue objection was untimely if not raised when plan adopted or shortly thereafter	Held: Court did not decide Terry rule broadly because neither party objected below to timeliness; here request was treated as timely by court and Department, so timeliness defense forfeited
Whether the circuit court’s termination order should stand despite Department’s failure to provide court‑ordered NSO services	Brown: Termination improper because Department never provided ordered, disability‑tailored services and did not sufficiently accommodate her	Department: Argued other independent findings (e.g., lack of parental motivation) justified termination	Held: Vacated termination for incomplete reasonable‑efforts analysis; remand required to assess whether failure to provide accommodations foreclosed reasonable‑efforts finding (court declined to accept Department’s post‑hoc reliance on other grounds)
Whether the Court of Appeals’ prescriptive checklist for handling parents with cognitive disabilities should be enforced	Brown: Court of Appeals’ steps offered useful guidance for accommodations	Department/others: Argued checklist not mandatory in every case	Held: Vacated that portion of Court of Appeals’ opinion—trial courts should assess reasonableness case‑by‑case rather than apply a universal mandatory checklist

Key Cases Cited

In re Terry, 240 Mich. App. 14 (Mich. Ct. App. 2000) (timeliness rule discussed for raising challenges to service plans)
In re Hicks, 315 Mich. App. 251 (Mich. Ct. App. 2016) (Court of Appeals decision holding termination premature for lack of reasonable accommodations)
Robertson v. Las Animas County Sheriff's Dep’t, 500 F.3d 1185 (10th Cir. 2007) (public entity must have knowledge of disability before ADA accommodations are required)
Pierce v. District of Columbia, 128 F. Supp. 3d 250 (D.D.C. 2015) (public entity cannot be passive; has affirmative duty to consider providing accommodations once aware of disability)