The primary question presented by this appeal is whether an employee’s inability to sit for a prolonged time may constitute a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. § 12101 et seq. The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Stein, J.) granted summary judgment in favor of Banco Industrial de Venezuela, C.A. (“BIV” or “the Bank”), dismissing Carmen Parada’s claims of discrimination and retaliation under the ADA and analоgous State and local laws, as well as her claim for overtime pay and penalties under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”), 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq. In dismissing the discrimination claim, the District Court held that Parada’s inability to sit for a prolonged period of time, due to a spinal injury that she sustained in 2007, could not constitute a disability under the ADA as a matter of law. For the reasons explained herein, we concludе that such a categorical legal determination is unwarranted and, accordingly, we vacate that portion of the judgment and remand for further proceedings. The District Court’s disposition of Parada’s remaining federal claims is affirmed.
BACKGROUND
1. Facts
In reviewing the District Court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of BIV, “we construe the evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, drawing all reasonable inferences and resolving all ambiguities in [her] favor.” In re Omnicom Grp., Inc. Sec. Litig.,
Parada worked for BIV as a Senior Letters of Credit Specialist, a largely sedentary job that involved organizing credit letter applications, ensuring that certain documents complied with various stan
Nearly six months into her job, in April 2007, Parada fell on a sidewalk and hurt her back severely enough that she could no longer sit for long periods of time. Her injury prompted her to stand for portions of the workday and to ice her neck and back. After diagnosing Parada with lum-bosacral and cervical sрrains and several spinal disc herniations, Parada’s doctors directed her to avoid sitting for prolonged periods.
Soon afterward, Parada requested an ergonomic chair from BIV’s Operations Manager, a bank supervisor. There is no dispute that an ergonomic chair might have enabled Parada to remain at work.
What followed was an unfortunate, months-long dispute between BIV and Parada about the extent of her disability, the duration of her leave of absence, and BIV’s repeated requests for additional medical documentation of her disability, including proof that she needed to be absent from work. At the оnset of the dispute, Parada’s orthopedist recommended that BIV provide her with an ergonomic chair, permit her frequent daily breaks, and allow her to obtain short-term disability insurance benefits from early December 2007 until January 7, 2008. BIV completed its portion of the short-term disability insurance benefit forms, and Parada applied for and received the benefits, initially until January 7, 2008.
On Jаnuary 8, 2008, Parada confirmed that she was unable to return to work. Another round of correspondence followed in which the Bank reprimanded Parada for not providing regular updates about her condition or medical confirmation that her extended absence was really necessary. Among other things, Parada responded with a medical report reaffirming that her neck and back injuries prevented her from “prolonged sitting.” Parada’s short-term disability benefits, which by then had been extended by one month, finally expired on February 11, 2008, and her application for long-term disability benefits was denied the following month. On May 1, 2008, the Bank effectively terminated Parada by sending her a letter that stated,
Despite our repeated requests, you have not provided us with documentation regarding your continued absence from work. We understand that your application for long-term disability benefits was denied on March 25, 2008, and you have not contacted us at all since thatdate. We therefore have no choice but to consider you to have abandoned your job, effective today....
Joint App’x 213.
That month, Parada, through an attorney, сontacted BIV in an effort to get overtime pay for the hours she had worked in excess of forty hours per week, notwithstanding BIV’s previous classification of her position as exempt from the FLSA’s overtime requirements. After Parada filed a claim in August 2008, the United States Department of Labor (“DOL”) conducted an investigation and determined that the Bank owed Parada $1,304.93 in overtime. DOL declined, though, to assess penalties, which would have been appropriate had the FLSA. violation' been willful. After the DOL’s determination, the Bank sent a check to Parada, who refused to accept it.
2. Procedural History
Parada, initially acting pro se, filed a complaint, which she amended in March 2010, alleging, among other things, that BIV had discriminated and retaliated against her by ignoring her requests for reasonable acсommodation of her 'back injury and subsequently firing her. The Bank moved to dismiss the amended complaint. After notifying the parties, the District Court converted the motion into one for summary judgment and granted it as to Parada’s disability discrimination claim, concluding that the inability to sit for a prolonged period is not a disability under the ADA. The District Court also granted the motion as to Parada’s retaliation claim on the ground that Parada failed to show enough temporal proximity between her requests for an ergonomic chair and her termination to give rise to an inference of causation between the two events. Citing the absence of evidence that the Bank had willfully violated the FLSA, the District Court also dismissed Parada’s FLSA overtime claim as barred by the two-year stаtute of limitations applicable to claims of nonwillful violations of the FLSA. See 29 U.S.C. § 255(a). Finally, the District Court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over Parada’s remaining claims under the New York State Human Rights Law (“NYSHRL”) and the New York City Human Rights Law (“NYCHRL”).
Parada appealed.
DlSCüSSION
1. ADA Discrimination Claim
On appeal, Parada makes two arguments with respect to her claim of discrimination under the ADA. First, Parada claims that the District Court should not have converted the Bank’s motion to dismiss into a motion for summary judgment. Second, Parada contends that the District Court wrongly concluded that her inability to sit for a prolonged period is not a disability under the ADA. We easily reject the first argument, but we agree with Par-ada’s second argument and hold that impairments that limit the ability to sit for long periods of time do not categorically fail to qualify as disabilities under the ADA.
a. Conversion of the Motion to Dismiss
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(d) provides as follows:
If, on a motion under Rule 12(b)(6) or 12(c), matters outside the pleadings are presented to and not excluded by the court, the motion must be treated as one for summary judgment under Rule 56. All parties must be given a reasonable opportunity to present all the material that is pertinent to the motion.
We review the District Court’s decision to convert BIV’s motion tо dismiss
“[A] district court acts properly in converting a motion for judgment on the pleadings into a motion for summary judgment when the motion presents matters outside the pleadings, but the rule requires that the court give sufficient notice to an opposing party and an opportunity for that party to respond.” Hernández v. Coffey,
b. Parada’s Alleged Disability
We turn to the District Court’s dismissal of Parada’s claim of discrimination undеr the ADA. As part of her prima facie case, a plaintiff must prove that she is “disabled” as defined under the ADA. See McMillan v. City of New York,
Relying principally on Colwell v. Suffolk County Police Department,
Some district courts have mistakenly interpreted Colwell as creating a per se rule that “the major life activity of sitting is substantially limited only if the plaintiffs impairment precludes him from sitting at all, not if the plaintiffs impairment merely makes it more difficult to sit.” Batac v. Pavarini Constr. Co., No. 03 Civ. 9783(PAC),
To read Colwell more broadly to state a categorical rule would conflict with our precedent in other ADA cases, in which we have rejected bright-line tests and instead emphasized the need for a fact-specific inquiry. See, e.g., McMillan,
Having clarified that the inability to sit even for a prolonged period of time may be a disability depending on the totality of the circumstances, we vacatе the District Court’s judgment relating to Parada’s claim of discrimination under the ADA. We leave it to the District Court on remand to determine in the first instance if the record reflects a genuine dispute of fact as to whether Parada’s inability to sit for a prolonged period of time constitutes a substantial limitation of a major life activity, and to address any remaining arguments advanced by the Bank in its summary judgment motion. We note that although Parada’s claims that she was “unable to sit, stand, and work” and that her lower back pain increased with “prolonged sitting” or “sitting for a long time” were somewhat vague as to duration, she submitted more specific medical reports in opposition to BIV’s motion to dismiss the FLSA claim. One of these reports stated that “she only can sit for 15 mins, then shе has to stand up, but before [February 19, 2008] she only can sit for 10 mins.” Joint App’x 790.
2. Retaliation Claim
Parada also asks us to vacate the District Court’s dismissal of her ADA retaliation claim. Reasoning that the four-month period between her requests for an ergonomic chair and her termination was too long to infer causation based on temporal proximity, the District Court held that Parada failed to estаblish a prima facie case of retaliation. In urging a contrary conclusion, Parada abandons on appeal the argument that termination constituted the relevant retaliatory act and points instead to BIV’s letters of reprimand, which preceded her termination and may be close enough in time to her requests for accommodation to satisfy the causation elеment. However, Parada did not argue in the District Court that BIV’s letters of reprimand constituted an adverse employment action for the purpose of establishing a prima facie case of retaliation. We therefore consider the argument to have been forfeited. See Allianz Ins. Co. v. Lemer,
3. FLSA Claim
Parada’s last day of work at BIV was November 8, 2007, and she filed her FLSA claim on December 23, 2009. The FLSA provides a two-year statute of limitations on actions to enforce its provisions, “except that a cause of action arising out of a willful violation may be commenced within three years after the cause of action accrued.” 29 U.S.C. § 255(a). Parada argues that her FLSA claim was timely because (1) she is entitled to equitable tolling based on DOL’s lengthy review of her claim and because of her brief illness, and (2) there was record evidence that the Bank’s FLSA violation was willful, thus triggering the three-yеar statute of limitations. We briefly address each argument in turn and ultimately affirm the District Court’s dismissal of the FLSA claim on statute of limitations grounds.
Pointing next to the three-year statute of limitations for willful FLSA violations under 29 U.S.C. § 255(a), Parada urges that BIV’s FLSA violation was “willful.” “[T]o prove a willful violation of the FLSA within the meaning of § 255(a), it must be established that the employer either knew or showed reckless disregard for the matter of whether its conduct was prohibited by the statute.” Reich v. Waldbaum, Inc.,
4. Supplemental Jurisdiction Over State and City Law Claims
In view of our decision to vacate the District Court’s dismissal of Parada’s claim of discrimination under the ADA, we also vacate the judgmеnt of the District Court dismissing Parada’s analogous discrimination and retaliation claims against BIV under the NYSHRL and the NYCHRL. See Rivera v. Rochester Genesee Reg’l Transp. Auth.,
Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the District Court’s judgment with respect to Parada’s claim under the FLSA as well as her claim of retaliation under the ADA, VACATE the District Court’s judgment with respect to Parada’s claim of discrimi
Notes
. Indeed, Parada borrowed a co-employee's ergonomic chair for a day and was able to complete her assignments without pain.
. We agree with the parties — and with every one of our sister circuits to have addressed the issue — that the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, Pub.L. No. 110-325, 122 Stat. 3553 (2008), is not retroactive and is therefore inapplicable to the conduct in this case, which occurred prior to the Act’s effective date of January 1, 2009. See Wehrley v. Am. Family Mut. Ins. Co.,
. After the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 the EEOC clarified that "[t]he term 'substantially limits’ shall be construed broadly in favor of expansive coverage, to the maximum extent permitted by the terms of the ADA” and "is not meant to be a demanding standard.” 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(j)(l)(i). Thus, "[a]n impairment need not prevent, or significantly or severely restrict, the individual from performing a major life activity in order to be considered substantially limiting.” Id. § 1630.2(j)(l)(ii).