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Employment Law

Texas House establishes anti-harassment work group

06/27/2018
A bipartisan team of 10 legislators will continue the Texas House of Representatives’ battle against sexual harassment within the halls of the Texas Capitol.

DOL rejects senators’ request for harassment study

06/27/2018
The U.S. Department of Labor has refused to help a group of Democratic senators seeking to determine the overall impact of workplace sexual harassment on the economy. Now the legislators, led by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, have turned to the Government Accountability Office for assistance.

DOL busts Bernie’s Burger Bus

06/27/2018
The companies that own the Bernie’s Burger Bus restaurant chain in Houston will have to pay $62,754 after investigators from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division discovered a scheme to divide workers’ hours between two limited liability corporations to deprive them of overtime pay.

Texas Supreme Court: FMLA leave doesn’t bar unemployment

06/27/2018
The Texas Supreme Court has decided someone on unpaid FMLA leave may be eligible for unemployment benefits.

You get to choose which promotion criteria to favor

06/27/2018
When setting promotion criteria, feel free to give educational attainment more weight than years of experience on the job. It’s your call.

Religiously affiliated organizations in Texas enjoy broad exemption from some lawsuits

06/27/2018
The ecclesiastical abstention doctrine essentially says that government cannot interfere unduly with how a religious organization operates. It provides protection for seemingly ordinary employment decisions that religious organizations make.

Remember the final step to make an arbitration agreement stick: Be sure to sign it!

06/27/2018
If you want to use arbitration to resolve employment disputes without going to court, you have to make sure you have done everything possible to make that agreement a binding, valid contract.

Beware retaliation against workers who testify

06/27/2018
Employees who testify on behalf of co-workers before the EEOC or in subsequent litigation are protected from retaliation. Be careful about how you treat employees following that kind of cooperation.

Typo in tax reform law could penalize harassment victims

06/27/2018
Last year’s comprehensive tax reform bill was rushed through Congress in record time. Predictably, that meant errors crept into the legislation—and some of them have had severe consequences.

Administration proposes combining DOL with Education Department

06/26/2018
The Department of Labor and the Department of Education would merge into one agency under a Trump administration proposal released June 21. The plan was announced as part of an effort to streamline Washington bureaucracy.