U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has a New I-9 Form. Is Your Business I-9 Compliant?

Kollman & Saucier
Kollman & Saucier
11/02/2023
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) issued a new I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification Form on August 1, 2023.  Effective November 1, 2023, businesses should now be using this new simplified form for all new and re-hire employees.  Instructions for the form can also be found on USCIS’s website.  With this new form, we are providing a refresher on what businesses must do in order to remain compliant. What Is An I-9...
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NLRB Issues New Joint Employer Rule

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) released today its Final Rule regarding the Standard for Determining Joint-Employer Status under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).  The NLRB press release states: Under the new standard, an entity may be considered a joint employer of a group of employees if each entity has an employment relationship with the employees and they share or codetermine one or more of the employees’ essential terms and...
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No Protected Activity, No Retaliation Claim

Kollman & Saucier
Kollman & Saucier
10/24/2023
Title VII’s anti-retaliation provision prohibits discrimination (retaliation) against employees and applicants because the individual “has opposed any practice made an unlawful employment practice by [Title VII], or because he has made a charge, testified, assisted, or participated in any manner in an investigation, proceeding, or hearing under [Title VII].”  42 U.S.C. § 2000e-3(a).  Employees and applicants who oppose discrimination...
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NLRB Releases Filing Statistics for FY 2023

Vincent Jackson
Vincent Jackson
10/19/2023
The National Labor Relations Board released case processing data for FY 2023.  The data shows that between October 1, 2022 and September 20, 2023, 22,448 cases were filed--a 10% increase over the previous fiscal year.  2023 also saw the highest number of cases filed since 2016. The increase in filings was spread across both unfair labor practice (ULP) charges and union representation-related activity.  Both categories of cases have seen...
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Trouble Ahead, Trouble Behind: ADA Week continued

Nearly everyone recognizes the Grateful Dead song “Casey Jones.”  It was first performed live by the Dead on June 20, 1969, at Fillmore East in New York (it’s track 8 on Workingman’s Dead).  It tells the true story of John Luther “Casey” Jones, from Cayce, Kentucky. Casey was a railroad engineer who drove a fast train and who died in 1900 when he collided with another train. A few days after the accident, Jones’s friend Wallace...
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Its Disability Employment Awareness Month

Darrell VanDeusen
Darrell VanDeusen
10/09/2023
According to the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM).  And 2023 is the 33d anniversary of enactment of the ADA, which was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush on July 26, 1990.  My blogs this week will focus on ADA issues. The choices are nearly limitless.  Recall that, while the ADA was the first nationwide law to apply to private and public sector employers – like Title...
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Employer’s Failure to Bargain with Union Proves Costly

Mathew Moldawer
Mathew Moldawer
10/05/2023
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has ordered a hospital in Puerto Rico to rehire and provide back pay to eleven maintenance employees who it deemed were illegally terminated.  The September 30, 2023 decision from the three-member panel found that the employer, Metro Health, Inc. d/b/a Hospital Metropolitano Rio Piedras violated Sections 8(a)(5) and (1) by its decision to subcontract the services performed by the Environmental Control...
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OSHA Begins New Initiative to Combat Diseases Resulting from Inhaled Silica

Mathew Moldawer
Mathew Moldawer
10/04/2023
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) began a new initiative to conduct enhanced enforcement and compliance assistance efforts in the engineered stone fabrication and installation industries. The September 22, 2023 Memorandum supplements a February 4, 2020 National Emphasis Program addressing “Respirable Crystalline Silica.” OSHA’s recognition of engineered stone as a hazard to workers goes as far back as 2015, when OSHA and...
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Repercussions of Supreme Court’s Groff Decision Start Appearing In Religious Exemption Cases

The impact of the Supreme Court’s June 2023 ruling in Groff v. DeJoy, which raised the standard for employers to accommodate religious exemptions, is beginning to be felt in lower courts.  Gone are the days when an employer can lawfully disregard a religious accommodation if it imposes more than a de minimis cost on the business.  With Groff, employers must now demonstrate that the burden of granting a religious accommodation for an employee...
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California is Poised to Become the First State to Ban Caste Discrimination

  Update - On October 7, 2023, Governor Newsom vetoed SB-403.  In his veto message, Governor Newsom stated "[b]ecause discrimination based on caste is already prohibited under ... existing [protected class] categories, this bill is unnecessary." On September 5, 2023, the California legislature passed SB-403, sending it to Governor Newsom’s desk for signature.  Largely expected to be signed by Gov. Newson, California is set to become the first...
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