Legal News

Dear Legal Mailbag: I try to be fair in dealing with teacher concerns, big and small. But the latest complaint has me stumped. One of my teachers woke up from a deep sleep and realized that she has been paid on the wrong track of the salary schedule...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

Dear Legal Mailbag: I am an avid reader of Legal Mailbag, and your advice has been helpful as I do my job as a principal. For example, I always thought that the First Amendment guaranteed teachers free speech rights, and I was surprised by your...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

Last week, I covered some of the basics to think about as the coronavirus continues to spread. Jon Hyman has a post today about whether the ADA might apply to the situation. But in Connecticut, there’s another case that employers ought to be...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

Dear Legal Mailbag: Under our teacher contract, requests for leave come first to me as the building principal, and then they go to the assistant superintendent with my recommendation. Yesterday, I got a request that is giving me a headache....By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

Back in 2009, it was hard not to miss press coverage of the H1N1 virus.  In fact, I wrote a series of posts about how employers could prepare for a possible pandemic while still complying with employment laws....By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

Recently, I saw a skiing dog. Oh, and it was wearing sunglasses too. To be fair (to the dog), it was actually tucked neatly in a backpack while the owner was in line for the chairlift....By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

The EEOC has long advised that asking about date of birth on job applications was a particularly bad idea. The ADEA does not explicitly prohibit an employer from asking an applicant’s age or date of birth....By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

The United States Department of Labor today released new regulations that dramatically change the existing rules on when two businesses are “joint employers” under federal wage and hour laws. The new rules impact so-called “horizontal” and...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

As part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, the cost of providing certain transportation fringe benefits, including employer-provided parking, to employees of tax-exempt organizations became subject to federal income tax as unrelated business...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP

On December 20, 2019, President Trump signed into law H.R. 1865, the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2020 (now Pub. L. 116-94) (the “Appropriations Act”), which, among other things, contains the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement...By: Shipman & Goodwin LLP