The Majority Opinion: Legal Blog

Doyle v. The City of New York - United States District Court, Southern District of New York Facts :  Plaintiffs were a group of individuals who performed services for the City of New York in exchange for dismissal of minor criminal charges.  The plaintiffs were not paid for completing the required community service.  These plaintiffs subsequently brought suit against the City and alleged that they qualified as employees for the work they performed, and thus were entitled to minimum wage for the services they rendered.  The City moved to dismiss the claims on the grounds that the plaintiffs were not "employees" under the Fair Labor Standards Act ("FLSA") and in the alternative, they fit within the statutory exemption for "volunteers".  Holding :  As the Court noted, this was an issue of first impression.  (For those not familiar with that phrase, the Court referred to the fact that this was the first time this type of legal issue had been rais...

Excuse the abbreviated post, but I'm traveling through Chicago today. Makes it tougher to write a post when I'm at the airport and not at my desk.     This week, I came across a few good articles dealing with employee time off work issues that I think readers would enjoy paying closer attention to.  In particular, the article that addressed unlimited vacation time in some companies was a very interesting read and one that I wanted to lead this post with, if for no other reason than this might become a more common practice among employers in the coming years. As always, below are few articles that caught my eye this week. A Closer Look at Vacation Days: What's Next? Dan Schwartz has a good discussion on vacation days in the workplace today and how many employees take little, if any, vacation nowadays.  Of note, I wanted to highlight the end of his article in which he talks about some companies that allow "unlimited" vacation days for employees.  Mig...

Satterwhite v. City of Houston - Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Facts :  Courtney Satterwhite ("Satterwhite") worked for the City of Houston ("City").  She reported a coworker, Harry Singh ("Singh"), for making a "Heil Hitler" comment during a meeting she attended in 2010.  (Singh claimed the said "you know, we're not in Hitler court.").  The Deputy Director of Human Resources verbally reprimanded Singh.  Singh later learned that Satterwhite had reported the comment.  After Singh became Satterwhite's supervisor in June, he reprimanded Satterwhite on various occassions:  Satterwhite apparently was not at his desk for prolonged periods of time without informing others of his whereabouts and Satterwhite apparently changed the policy regarding how the office handled incoming government mail without properly communicating information about the change.  After the first incident, Satterwhite became upset and yelled at Singh....

For those readers keeping track, I have documented several NFL cheerleader lawsuits over the past year or so that have alleged potential wage and hour issues.  One of the cases filed was by a group of Tampa Bay Buccaneers cheerleaders who brought suit on the grounds that they were unlawfully compensated by the team, in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act ("FLSA").  ( Tampa Bay Buccaneers Cheerleaders File Wage & Hour Suit - Blog ).   Earlier this month, the Buccaneers cheerleaders and the team agreed to settle the suit for $825,000.00, on a claim that originally demanded $661,000.00.  Note that once the $264,000.00 in attorney's fees are taken out, the remaining settlement amount will be split among more than 90 cheerleaders (which amounts to about $6,000.00 for each member of this class action).  This one is surprising, in that it settled rather quickly (given that it was one of the later FLSA cheerleader lawsuits filed last year)....

Earlier this month, several unions in Illinois filed a lawsuit in state court to block an Executive Order signed by Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner in February which would bar unions from requiring all state workers to pay the equivalent of dues.   Note that in Illinois, employees who decline to join a union are required to pay "fair share" fees under the theory that these employees enjoy the benefit of higher wages and benefits the union negotiated on their behalf.  By law, these fees cannot be used for political reasons, however Governor Rauner claimed it is impossible to separate political activity from union bargaining because public sector employees negotiate directly with the government.  As a result, Governor Rauner's Executive Order would end the practice of forcing state workers who choose not to join a union from having to pay "fair share" fees to fund union activity.    The unions which brought the lawsuit ask the state court judge to p...

Every so often, a find a few articles any given week on labor & employment law related issues in a particular state that I think deserve special attention.  In this case, there are several good articles on a few different labor & employment law related issues in California that I want to highlight.  This post runs the gamut from office betting pools, to days of rest under the California Labor Code, all the way to Oakland's new minimum wage and paid sick leave laws (and do not forget the additional article on document review workers and their FLSA fight)...wow! As always, below are a few articles that caught my eye this week. Office Betting Pools in California: Legal...or Not? Anytime there is a big sporting event, whether it be the Super Bowl, March Madness, the World Series, etc., office betting pools start up.  The question then becomes, are these pools legal?  Jeffrey Polsky has a quick note on how these office betting pools are "technica...

National Football League Players' Association (on behalf of Adrian Peterson) v. the National Football League - U.S. District Court of Minnesota Facts :  For those unfamiliar with Adrian Peterson's legal issues, Peterson was disciplined by the NFL for alleged misconduct in May 2014 when Peterson caused injury to his child when he was disciplined.   As a result of an outcry against the rather lenient punishment Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice got for knocking out his fiance (initially, Rice was given only a two game suspension), in August 2014, the NFL Commissioner issued an enhanced personal conduct policy and increased penalties for violations of the policy.  Even though Peterson's actions occurred in May 2014, Commissioner Roger Goodell enforced the new policy against Peterson and suspended him for the remainder of the 2014 season, fined him six weeks pay, and ordered him to participate in counseling and treatment.  The Commissioner further st...