Amid a flurry of Executive Orders coming from his office, on March 19 Governor Cuomo signed into law a new statute requiring employers to provide quarantine leave to employees who are subject to mandatory or precautionary quarantine or isolation orders issued by the state government, the Department of Health or other government entities with the authority to issue such an order. The emergency quarantine leave law specifically applies to COVID-19 and provides the following entitlements:…

Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker issued a new emergency order today, March 23, 2020, concerning the continued operations of “essential services,” the closure of certain workplaces, and revised assemblage restrictions (the “Order”). Below is a non-exhaustive list of key provisions of the Order. If you have any questions about your specific business operations or other COVID-19 related matters, please let us know. The Order creates a list of business operations and services that are considered essential…

New Jersey Supreme Court Issues Final Say on Workplace Protections for Employee Medical Cannabis Use On Tuesday, March 10th, the New Jersey Supreme Court issued its much anticipated decision in Wild v. Carriage Funeral Holdings, Inc., et al.,(A-91-18) (082836), affirming that a medical cannabis patient can assert a claim for employment discrimination under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (NJLAD) for an adverse employment action based on an employee’s off-site medical cannabis use. Notably, the…

New Jersey Supreme Court Issues Final Say on Workplace Protections for Employee Medical Cannabis Use On Tuesday, March 10th, the New Jersey Supreme Court issued its much anticipated decision in Wild v. Carriage Funeral Holdings, Inc., et al.,(A-91-18) (082836), affirming that a medical cannabis patient can assert a claim for employment discrimination under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (NJLAD) for an adverse employment action based on an employee’s off-site medical cannabis use. Notably, the…

Virginia and Colorado are now the fourth and fifth states, respectively, and Montgomery County, Maryland is the first local government to ban hair discrimination. The bans in all three jurisdictions clarify that discrimination based on a person’s hairstyle or texture is a form of racial discrimination. The Virginia ban was made official on March 4, 2020 when Governor Ralph Northam signed Senate Bill 50. The bill amends the Virginia Human Rights Act to add…

Labor and Employment Counsel Ira Shepard Discusses Human Resources and The Courts In February, several labor and employment law cases and regulatory actions with implications for the higher education workplace were decided. In a blog post for CUPA-HR, Counsel Ira Shepard summarized the latest. The following issues are discussed: Immigrant insensitive social media post is insufficient grounds to sustain discharge. NLRB’s processing of Adjunct Professors’ unionization petition at a Church operated school dismissed for…

Today, the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) is issuing a much anticipated final rule providing guidance on determining whether two employers are “joint employers” for purposes of the National Labor Relations Act (the “Act”). The joint employer standard determines whether a business is treated as the employer of employees directly employed by another, separate employer. The potential for a joint employer relationship is therefore of particular concern for businesses that engage staffing companies; that…