Kerri Beatty On November 16, 2021, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit was selected in a lottery to address the many legal disputes relating to OSHA’s recent Emergency Temporary Standard (“ETS”). As previously reported, since the ETS was published on November 5, 2021, 34 petitions had been filed in 12 different federal appeals … Read more
Governor Kathy Hochul signed a bill that expands New York State’s Paid Family Leave legislation to allow caring for siblings. Paid Family Leave has been in effect since 2018 and is employee-paid insurance that provides paid time off to care for a newborn, bond with adopted or foster children, care for a family member with … Read more
On October 31, 2021, the Commissioner of the New York Department of Health announced that the designation of COVID-19 as a highly contagious communicable disease that presents a risk of harm to the public is extended until December 15, 2021. As you may recall, all employers, regardless of size, were required to establish an airborne infectious … Read more
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) has issued updates to the COVID-19 Technical Assistance to provide additional guidance on religious exemptions to vaccine mandates in the workplace. The updated guidance provides a new section “L” entitled Vaccinations – Title VII and Religious Objections to COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates, which follows a Question and Answer (“Q&A”) … Read more
The New York State Department of Labor (“NYSDOL”) has published guidance intended to address some of the most common situations or questions in the workplace related to adult-use cannabis and the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act (“MRTA”). As you may recall, under the MRTA, employers may take employment action or prohibit employee conduct where: An … Read more
Governor Kathy Hochul recently signed legislation allowing employees facing potential layoff to petition employers to participate in a Shared Work Program. Under this amendment to the New York Labor Law, workers facing layoffs in New York State now have a right to ask their employers instead to trim all worker’s hours and have unemployment insurance … Read more