Workforce Bulletin

This week’s top story on Employment Law This Week: The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) plans to roll back a controversial reporting rule initiated at the end of the Obama administration.

OSHA has proposed rescinding parts of a 2017 rule that requires companies with 250 or more employees to submit detailed reports on workplace injuries. OSHA says this move would protect employee privacy and reduce the burden for employers. Three organizations have filed suit over the proposed changes, saying that the data from the detailed reports helps improve ...

The expiration date for the U.S. Department of Labor’s (“DOL”) model Family and Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) notice and medical certification forms has once again been extended. The new expiration date is now August 31, 2018. Expiration dates are located at the top right corner of the model FMLA forms.

The DOL’s model FMLA notices and certification forms were originally due to expire on May 31, 2018, then again on June 30, 2018, and the DOL has again pushed the expiration date, now to the end of August, from the July 31, 2018 expiration date. Once approved by the Federal Office of ...

The U.S. Department of Labor’s (“DOL”) model Family and Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) notices and medical certification forms expire on July 31, 2018. However, the new model forms have not yet been released. The current FMLA forms were originally due to expire on May 31, 2018, but the expiration date was first extended to June 30, 2018 and then to July 31, 2018.

Every three years, the DOL must obtain approval for continued use of its forms from the Federal Office of Management and Budget (“OMB”). Once the OMB approves the new model FMLA forms, they will be valid through 2021 ...

A legislative bargain requires give-and-take from all stakeholders. On June 28, 2018, Massachusetts Governor Baker signed House Bill 4640, “An Act Relative to Minimum Wage, Paid Family Medical Leave, and the Sales Tax Holiday” (the “Act”). This “grand bargain” gradually raises the minimum wage, provides for paid family and medical leave, makes permanent the Commonwealth’s annual tax holiday, and phases out Sunday and holiday premium pay requirements. While Massachusetts employers must now adjust to an increased minimum wage and new paid family medical leave ...

On July 9, 2018, Governor Edmund Brown, Jr. signed into law Assembly Bill 2770 (“AB 2770”) to protect victims of sexual harassment and employers from defamation claims brought by alleged harassers. AB 2770 was sponsored by the California Chamber of Commerce and passed by the California Legislature to address the chilling effect that the threat of defamation suits can have on harassment victims and employers: deterring victims and witnesses from coming forward; deterring employers from telling prospective employers about a genuine harasser; and allowing repeat sexual ...

We published an article with NYSBA Labor and Employment Law Journal, titled “Employee Threats to Critical Technologies Are Best Addressed Through a Formalized Insider Threat Risk Assessment Process and Program.” With the New York State Bar Association's permission, we have linked it here.

Our colleague Brian W. Steinbach at Epstein Becker Green has a post on the Wage & Hour Defense Blog that will be of interest to our readers in the hospitality industry: “Proposed D.C. Council Legislation Puts Voter-Approved Elimination of Tip Credit Into Question.”

In our June 28, 2018 post on District of Columbia voters approving Initiative 77, which would incrementally increase the minimum cash wage for tipped workers to $15.00 per hour by July 1, 2025, and effectively eliminate the tip credit staring July 1, 2026, we noted the possibility of action by the D.C. Council to ...

On June 25, 2018, President Trump signed into law the Whistleblower Protection Coordination Act (the “Act”), permanently reinstating the Whistleblower Ombudsman Program, which was created in 2012 to encourage employees of federal government administrative agencies to report wrongdoing but expired on November 27, 2017 due to a five-year sunset clause.

The Act, which Congress passed with bipartisan support, reauthorizes a “Whistleblower Protection Coordinator” at each administrative agency’s Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) to educate agency ...

Yesterday, the New York Attorney General (“NYAG”) announced a settlement with national retailer Aldo Group Inc. (“Aldo”) for violation of New York City’s ban the box law, which, among other things, prohibits employers from inquiring into a prospective employee’s criminal history on an initial employment application. The NYAG’s investigation revealed that (i) Aldo’s employment applications impermissibly inquired into the applicant’s criminal history and (ii) Aldo lacked consistent policies and procedures for evaluating the criminal records of ...

Our colleague Paul DeCamp at Epstein Becker Green has a post on the Wage & Hour Defense Blog that will be of interest to our readers in the hospitality industry: “Supreme Court Prevents Successive Class Actions from Reviving Time-Barred Claims.”

In most wage and hour cases, each workweek gives rise to a separate claim, at least for statute of limitations purposes. Thus, an employee seeking payment for alleged off-the-clock work or an independent contractor claiming misclassification and entitlement to overtime ordinarily may seek back wages and related recovery only ...