Is the California Supreme Court about to make it more difficult to dispose of whistleblower retaliation claims?  That may well be the case. The Supreme Court has agreed to answer the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals’ question about California law and unlawful retaliation against an employee in Lawson v. PPG Architectural Finishes, Inc. In particular, the 9th Circuit asks the California Supreme Court to set the evidentiary standard for whistleblower retaliation claims brought under California Labor Code section 1102.5. The Lawson case involves a manufacturer of paint, stains, caulks, and other products. Mr. Lawson was a territory manager whose duties…

Current and former employees have a right to inspect their personnel file at reasonable times. So, when a current or former employee intends to bring or has brought a claim against their employer, they will likely request a copy of their personnel file. However, if the employer has failed to properly maintain their employee’s personnel files, there isn’t a rewind button to recreate that file. This is what litigators would like employers to know about employee personnel files. Maintaining Employee Personnel Files To comply with the requirements under California law to allow inspection of employee personnel files, an employer must…

California currently has a patchwork of local COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave ordinances which remain in effect in 2021. But what about employers that are not located in those localities with a supplemental paid sick leave ordinance? Or employees who have exhausted supplement paid sick leave allotments? Before the pandemic, California had the Healthy Workplace Healthy Family Act of 2014 (the Act), which mandated most employers in the state provide paid sick leave to employees.  Under the Act, employers must provide for the accrual of one hour for every 30 hours worked by the employee and allow the use of…

Following in the footsteps of the City of Long Beach, the cities of Montebello and Oakland have passed premium pay ordinances mandating additional pay for certain grocery and drug store employees. Premium pay or “hazard pay” for grocery employees seems to be the new trend in COVID-19 regulations. This trend continues despite recent lawsuits filed in federal courts by the California Grocers Association, seeking to block the new ordinances in Long Beach, Oakland, and Montebello. The city of Montebello passed its urgency ordinance on January 27, 2021. The ordinance applies to grocery and drug stores with at least 300…

California SB 973 requires employers that (1) file EEO-1 reports and (2) employ more than 100 employees to submit data to the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) annually that shows pay by race and gender for their California employees. It was signed into law on September 30, 2020, and DFEH has been busy providing guidance to employers and preparing the pay data reporting portal. Additional — perhaps final — guidance was released on February 1. DFEH posted FAQs addressing Professional Employer Organizations and Acquisitions, Mergers, and Spinoffs. It also released a 68-page User Guide that discuss the…

In 2020, employers with employees in California were inundated with new compliance requirements brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. It seemed that another local government or the state passed a COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave requirement nearly every month.  These supplemental sick leave benefits applied to employees who were not covered by the federal Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). Many of the ordinances were written to sunset with the FFCRA or on December 31, 2020. Read the full article at Jackson Lewis Disability, Leave & Health Management Blog.…

COVID-19 cases continue to surge around Southern California, causing the region to remain under the restrictions imposed by the statewide Regional Stay at Home Order longer than previously predicted. In response, local governments are looking for ways to reward the grocery workers who have been deemed essential since the start of the pandemic. The City of Long Beach is the first to pass a “Hero Pay” ordinance, which requires certain grocery stores to pay workers “premium pay,” or additional compensation that is separate from an employee’s base pay, bonuses, commissions, and tips. The ordinance went into effect immediately on January…