ADA

Karen Lindholdt’s 1999 Litigation using the Americans with Disabilities Act:

Karen Lindholdt was a charter attorney at the innovative Center for Justice in Spokane, Washington, where she engaged powerful agricultural lobbies in the interest of her clients who were suffering from respiratory ailments.

In 1998, she discovered a way to apply the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to health problems worsened by smoke from field burning that was polluting streets, playgrounds, and workplaces in Eastern Washington:

“’Once I read [the Iowa-based “Heather K.”] case and studied the ADA,’ Lindholdt said, ‘it looked to me that there couldn’t be a better fit. The right to breathe and the right to leave your house, that’s what the ADA is all about, obtaining these basic rights for people with disabilities.’”

The upshot? She took the case to mediation and won on behalf of her sick clients. In May 2006, all parties that were battling in court announced their support for the new state rules created to govern cereal grain burning.

Her legal work caught the eye of an Idaho-based public-interest group named Safe Air for Everyone. SAFE hired her to represent its interests in Idaho and federal courts. “In 2007, Lindholdt and the SAFE legal team scored a stunning victory in federal court that forced the Idaho officials and growers in Idaho who burn bluegrass and wheat fields to completely overhaul state rules for field burning to bring the practice into compliance with the federal Clean Air Act. The blueprint for the Idaho rules came from the rules adopted in Washington . . . . Thus, the final effect of the Washington State lawsuit was to develop new rules for field burning that now protect vulnerable citizens in both Washington and Idaho.”

Article excerpts from “Every Breath He Takes,” in the newsletter for the nonprofit law firm the Center for Justice, March 2, 2009: http://cforjustice.org/2009/03/02/every-breath-he-takes/

ACLU

What the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said about Karen Lindholdt in 2009:

“She is one of the most experienced attorneys on staff and has demonstrated herself to be a strong advocate for her clients. She routinely negotiates very favorable resolutions for her clients. She also goes to trial when appropriate. Ms. Lindholdt has been invaluable . . . as an attorney capable of handling very serious and/or complex cases without the need for close supervision” (6).
“ . . . retaining her is critical to the long term success of the [Grant County, WA, Felony Public Defender Program] program.”
– Francisco Rodriguez, ACLU Settlement Monitor, Best, et al. v. Grant County, Monitor’s Report First Quarter, April 27, 2009