Time 7 Minute Read

Employers with more than 25 employees must provide COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave to their California employees under a recent law signed by the Governor.  This new law is broader than California’s prior COVID-19 paid sick leave law and, unlike the prior law, also covers employees who telework. The new sick leave entitlement is retroactive to January 1, 2021 and extends until September 30, 2021.

Who Must Provide Supplemental Paid Sick Leave?

SB 95 covers all employers with more than 25 employees. California’s prior COVID-19 sick leave law (Assembly Bill 1867) expired on December 31, 2020, and applied only to private businesses with 500 or more employees.

Time 4 Minute Read

California employers may mandate employee vaccination under new guidance from the State’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH).  With the opening up of California businesses and expansion of vaccine eligibility, a key question facing employers has been whether they can require their employees to get vaccinated.  On March 4, 2021, California’s DFEH finally weighed in with its updated COVID-19 Guidance on several open questions regarding employee vaccination under California law.  The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) provided similar initial guidance late last year on how mandatory vaccination programs could comply with federal law.

Time 3 Minute Read

The U.S. Department of Labor recently issued guidance to state unemployment insurance agencies, expanding the categories of workers that are eligible for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance. The PUA program was created in March 2020 to provide payments to certain people affected by COVID-19, as well as independent contractors and gig workers who do not usually qualify for unemployment insurance.  While funded by the federal government, states are responsible for administering it.

New Eligibility Categories

This new DOL guidance expands eligibility to three categories of ...

Time 4 Minute Read

While COVID-19 may have hit the business community like a hurricane, whether the pandemic, in fact, qualifies for a natural disaster exception under the federal law requiring businesses to warn employees of impending layoffs, remains an open question.

This February, a federal judge paved the way for the Eleventh Circuit to weigh in on whether a class action can proceed against an employer who was forced to lay off employees due to COVID-19.  That case, Benson v. Enter. Leasing Co. of Orlando, LLC, is one of the first to look at the application of pandemic-related layoffs to the Worker Adjustment Retraining Notification Act of 1988, 29 U.S.C. § 2100 et seq. (“WARN Act”). Underscoring the case’s importance to the business community, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has just filed an amicus or “friend of the court” brief asking the Eleventh Circuit to take up the case and provide “much-needed guidance” to other courts across the country.

Time 4 Minute Read

Closures of schools and day care centers during the COVID-19 pandemic have put heightened focus on the child care challenges faced by working parents.  The California legislature is aiming to address these challenges by introducing a bill that, if passed, would require employers to provide subsidized backup child care benefits to employees. While this may help working parents, it also would place additional burdens on employers, many of whom are already over-taxed by the increased costs and depressed revenues caused by the pandemic.

Time 4 Minute Read

Many employers use rounding methods to adjust the hours that an employee works to the nearest time increment, such as every five or ten minutes.  The California Supreme Court has ruled, however, that this rounding practice is impermissible at the meal period.  Equally as troubling for employers, the Court also held that time records showing a noncompliant meal period raise a “rebuttable presumption” of meal period violations.

Time 3 Minute Read

In January 2021, New York City amended the Fair Chance Act to expand protections for both applicants and employees with criminal histories.  The amendments take effect July 29, 2021, adding additional protections for workers in the state.  Prior to the amendment, NYC’s Fair Chance Act prohibited employers from making an inquiry about an applicants’ criminal conviction records until after a conditional offer of employment is extended.  Then, an employer was required to balance a variety of factors to determine job-relatedness of the conviction.

Time 8 Minute Read

Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (“Title III”) prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in public accommodations, requiring that individuals with a disability be offered the “full and equal enjoyment . . . of any place of public accommodation.”  42 U.S.C. § 12182(a).  As we previously discussed, the 30-year-old statute does not directly address whether “places of public accommodation” include websites, mobile applications, and other emerging web-based applications and technologies and, therefore, does not provide a standard for ensuring accessibility for web-based accommodations.

Time 1 Minute Read

HuntonAK Labor and Employment Partners Bob Dumbacher and Kurt Powell have been recognized in the most recent publication of Georgia Super Lawyers 2021.

  • Bob Dumbacher, Employment and Labor, Rising Star
  • Kurt Powell, Employment and Labor

Super Lawyers acknowledges outstanding practice group lawyers “who have attained a high-degree of peer recognition and professional achievement.”

Bob and Kurt were both recently recognized by Benchmark Litigation as Labor and Employment Stars, Georgia, 2020.

Read the Firm press releases for information.

Congratulations!

Time 5 Minute Read

With the ushering in of a new administration, several changes have quickly taken place at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

Within hours of taking office, the Biden administration removed Trump appointee NLRB General Counsel Peter Robb and replaced him with interim General Counsel Peter Ohr.  (Ohr may only serve as acting General Counsel for 40 days, per the National Labor Relations Act, unless the administration submits a nomination to the Senate.)  At least one employer has already sought the dismissal of an unfair labor practice charge arguing that Ohr lacks authority to prosecute the case because Robb was unlawfully removed prior to the expiration of his term.

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