On July 10, Henry J. Zaccardi and Ashley L. Marshall presented a complimentary webinar summarizing new laws passed in the 2019 legislative session of the Connecticut General Assembly. Among the topics discussed were changes to sexual harassment prevention training requirements, paid family medical leave, CT’s minimum wage, and new whistleblower protections. Many employers across the
Over the last week, the General Assembly passed two bills (Senate Bill 3 and 1111) that, when taken together, provide a series of reforms that will impact every Connecticut employer in one way or another. These bills are expected to be signed by Governor Lamont shortly and thus, these requirements will likely go into effect
The Connecticut Appellate Court ruled this week that an employee’s request for extended intermittent leave is not a “reasonable” accommodation under the state’s anti-discrimination laws. You can download Barbabosa v. Board of Education here.
The decision provides some much needed guidance to an area that has been increasingly litigated — namely whether a medical leave, above and beyond FMLA leave, is required as a reasonable accommodation.
The background on the case is fairly straightforward and might be familiar to some who have dealt with employees.
Continue Reading If Attendance is Mandatory For Job, Is Intermittent Leave Ever a “Reasonable” Accommodation?
When Chastity Jones, a black woman from Alabama, lost a job offer because she refused to cut her natural locs, she turned to the federal courts. The company told Ms. Jones that her natural hairstyle violated the company’s grooming policy because locs “tend to get messy.” In response, Jones sought the assistance of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (the “EEOC”) which brought a Title VII claim against the company
Continue Reading Hairstyle Biases: What Employers Should Know About Hair and Race Discrimination
This week, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously reversed an earlier Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decision and held that courts may not decide a question of arbitrability when parties have contractually delegated that question to an arbitrator. Henry Schein, Inc. v. Archer & White Sales, Inc., No. 17-1272 (U.S. January 8, 2019).
While on its
The Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities just released their annual statistics. For employers, understanding the trend lines represents an opportunity to focus on areas of compliance. You can download the statistics here.
Here are three key takeaways:
Does the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (the “ADEA”) apply to all public employers regardless of how many employees they have, or does it only apply to public employers with at least 20 employees? This is the question that was argued at the Supreme Court on October 1, 2018 in Mount Lemmon Fire District v.
In its latest enforcement move to address workplace harassment, the EEOC has filed seven different lawsuits since June 11 seeking damages and an end to alleged harassment across a broad spectrum of settings. The lawsuits are spread across many different industries–from one of the nation’s largest trucking companies, to a staffing agency, and even a
Cell phones are everywhere, and now smart phones with their apps have more functions than many computers. One of those functions is the ability to record without anyone knowing that they are being recorded. In the workplace, such actions can cause concerns as managers and supervisors frequently feel that employees are recording their conversations and
On May 21, 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision that upheld an arbitration clause requiring employees to arbitrate their claims in lieu of participating in a class action. In issuing its decision, the Supreme Court actually resolved three separate cases, all of which involved employees signing agreements to arbitrate individual employment claims. The