Starbucks can enforce ‘one button’ dress code 
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: May 15, 2012
Tags: dress code, Labor, NLRB, Starbucks
Starbucks didn’t commit an unfair labor practice when it implemented a dress code limiting employees to wearing only one pro-union button on their work uniforms, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in National Labor Relations Board v. Starbucks Corp., no. 10-3511-ag. (May 10). The National Labor Relations Board issued an order [...]
Worker can sue over same-sex touching
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: May 14, 2012
Tags: hostile environment claim, lawsuit, same-sex touching, Title VII
A female corrections worker could maintain a Title VII hostile environment claim based on an allegation that her female supervisor repeatedly brushed against her breasts, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in reversing a summary judgment, Redd v. New York State Division of Parole, no. 10-1410-cv. (May 4). The plaintiff worked [...]
State improperly paid workers’ comp to inmates
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: May 10, 2012
Tags: inmates, New York State, Workers compensation
New York state paid seven inmates more than $36,000 in workers’ compensation benefits while they were in prison even though they weren’t eligible, according to an examination by New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. The audit found that the State Insurance Fund, the agency that administers the state’s workers’ compensation program and in [...]
EEOC issues guidance on worker criminal background checks
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: May 2, 2012
Tags: criminal background checks, EEOC, employees, new guidance
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has issued updated guidance on employers’ use of criminal background checks in making employment decisions. According to EEOC officials, the new guidance, the first since the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1991, which codified Title VII disparate impact analysis, was designed to take into account how changes in [...]
EEOC adds transgender to protected list
By Todd Etshman
POSTED: April 30, 2012
Tags: EEOC, protected list, transgender rights
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender groups are praising the recent Equal Employment Opportunity Commission decision in Macy v. Holder (appeal no. 0120120821), to extend Title VII employment discrimination protection to transgender individuals. “Applying Title VII in this manner does not create a new ‘class’ of people covered under Title VII,” Acting Executive Officer Bernadette B. [...]
Overtime for drug sales reps weighed
By The Associated Press
POSTED: April 16, 2012
Tags: drug sales reps, overtime, U.S. supreme court
WASHINGTON — A seemingly divided U.S. Supreme Court on Monday weighed a potentially costly challenge to the pharmaceutical industry’s practice of not paying overtime to its sales representatives. The justices questioned whether the federal law governing overtime pay should apply to the roughly 90,000 people who try to persuade doctors to prescribe certain drugs to [...]
NLRB regs set to take effect in late April
By Todd Etshman
POSTED: March 5, 2012
Tags: employers, new regulations, NLRB, rights, unions
Two new National Labor Relations Board regulations for employers are set to take effect on April 30 assuming federal court decisions or political opposition doesn’t further delay them. The first regulation requires union and non-union employers to post 11-by-17-inch notices generally informing employees of their rights pursuant to the National Labor Relations Act. Included in [...]
Question of time in workers’ comp case
By Kimberly Atkins
POSTED: January 16, 2012
Tags: injury benefits, time element, U.S. supreme court, wage, Workers compensation
In a decision that could impact how injury benefits under a number of statutes that base calculations on the national average weekly wage, the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court considered just when injured claimants are entitled to compensation under the Longshore and Harbor Worker’ Compensation Act — the date a disabled worker was injured [...]
Engineer union members charged
By Daily Record Staff
POSTED: January 12, 2012
Tags: engineers, grand jury indictments, union members
A federal grand jury has indicted 10 members of Operating Engineers Local 17 in Erie County. They are charged with a violent scheme to extort jobs and compensation associated with those jobs from both local and out-of-town businesses and their employees. The indictment accuses the defendants, including high-ranking officers of Local 17, with conspiracy to [...]
State liable for worker injury
By Todd Etshman
POSTED: January 5, 2012
Tags: Appellate Division, construction worker, Fourth Department, Labor Law, New York State Court of Claims
The Appellate Division, Fourth Department upheld a New York State Court of Claims decision in favor of a construction worker who was injured when an unsecured skid box fell from on a forklift and struck him in the back. The Court of Claims found the state, which hired a company to work on several Buffalo-area [...]
Elevation considered in labor law case
By Denise M. Champagne
POSTED: January 3, 2012
Tags: Appellate Division, construction accident, elevated workplaces, Fourth Department, Labor Law
The cause of a construction accident will need to be determined before various claims for damages may be sorted out. The claims fall under a section of labor law dealing with elevated workplaces. While the workers involved in the accident did not need the elevated workplace protections, their injuries may still be related to the [...]
Wage act reporting begins in 2012
By Todd Etshman
POSTED: December 21, 2011
Tags: department of labor, employees, Wage Theft Prevention Act
Human Resources Departments in New York have more than employee tax forms to distribute in the New Year. They’ll also have to distribute wage information notices to all their employees by Feb. 1 and obtain signed acknowledgements that the employees received it. The New York Department of Labor has posted template forms and information to [...]
