This Friday’s Five is a bit of everything: news, new California employment laws, and reminders about October 1 deadlines for the City of San Diego:
1. House moves to delay DOL overtime rule implementation.
There is a great article by Lisa Jennings from Nation’s Restaurant News summarizing the House’s move to delay the overtime rule implementation, which is set to go into place on December 1, 2016. The White House has already threatened to veto the bill if it makes it to the President’s desk. For more information about the DOL overtime rules, visit my posts here.
2. San Diego employers need to ensure they are in compliance with the October 1, 2016 deadline.
The City of San Diego’s new paid sick leave law (and its “implementing ordinance”) requires employers to provide written notice to employees about the paid sick leave law by October 1, 2016 (yes – that is tomorrow). The Implementing Ordinance requires that every employer must also provide each employee at the time of hire, or by October 1, 2016, whichever is later, written notice of the employer’s legal name and any fictitious business names, address, and telephone number and the employer’s requirements under the law. The notice must also include information on how the employer satisfies the requirements of the law, including the employer’s method of earned sick leave accrual. The notice must be provided to employees in English and in each employee’s primary language, if it is a language if it is spoken by at least five percent of the employees at the employer’s workplace. Employers may provide this notice through an accessible electronic communication in lieu of a paper notice. The City published a form notice to comply with these requirements, which can be downloaded here.
3. Governor signs law making it illegal for out-of-state employers to have their disputes heard outside of California.
Governor Brown signed S.B 1241 into law that restricts employers from requiring employees who primarily reside and work in California to adjudicate claims outside of California when the claim arose in California, or deprive employees of California law with respect of claims arising in California.
Employers should carefully review their arbitration agreements with California employees to ensure that the agreement does not have a choice of law provision that applies another state’s law to the agreement or require any claims be adjudicated outside of California. The effective date for the law is January 1, 2017.
4. New CA law prohibits employers from asking about juvenile convictions.
A.B. 1843, signed into the law by Governor Brown on September 27, 2016 prohibits employers from asking or taking into consideration juvenile convictions. The law states, “employers [are prohibited] from asking an applicant for employment to disclose, or from utilizing as a factor in determining any condition of employment, information concerning or related to an arrest, detention, processing, diversion, supervision, adjudication, or court disposition that occurred while the person was subject to the process and jurisdiction of juvenile court law.”
5. NCAA and Pac-12 sued by former USC football player for unpaid wages.
An interesting class action lawsuit was filed by a former USC football player claiming that the NCAA and Pac-12 violated the Fair Labor Standards Act and California law by not paying football players minimum wage or overtime. This is a different twist to the often debated issue of whether college athletes should be allowed to accept endorsement money. It will be interesting to see how the lawsuit develops: on one side there is an argument that as the college sports programs have turned into huge profit generating centers sports, not academics could be seen as the primary focus for these athletes, but on the other hand the players are still students and many school programs do not generate huge revenues for the schools.