Management-Side Firm Whines Because EEOC Mediators Are Doing Their Jobs

The law firm Fox Rothschild, LLP has posted a series of blog posts where they complain bitterly about EEOC mediators. They claim the mediators are unfair because they have the nerve (the noive!) to tell employers that EEOC could enter a cause finding in their case. The whining began with a survey by Merrily Archer where she asked management-side folks who participated in EEOC mediations whether or not mediators mentioned "cause" findings as a possibility. She found that they did so in 73.7% of cases. In 70% of cases, mediators mentioned to employers that EEOC could possibly bring a suit against the employer if they found cause.

Other lawyers weighed in and said that EEOC mediations are no different from other employment mediations, in that mediators do mention possible "cause" findings and other worst-case scenarios when trying to bring about settlements. But Fox Rothschild is now claiming that EEOC mediators should not do what every other mediator does.

They make three arguments for why EEOC mediators should be banned from mentioning the dread but rare "cause" finding:

1. Unlike Private Mediators (or Magistrate Judges), EEOC Mediators Represent a Federal Agency that Wields Broad Enforcement Authority and Prosecutorial Discretion
2. Unlike Private Mediators (or even Magistrate Judges), EEOC Mediators Represent a Federal Agency that Measures Its "Efficacy" by Its Employer Collections
3. Unlike Private Mediators (or even Magistrate Judges), MOST EEOC Mediators are Not Lawyers 

So let me get this straight. Other mediators mention worst-case scenarios and that's okay. But EEOC mediators should paint a rosy pro-employer picture because they work for EEOC? All this whining fails to mention that EEOC mediators do not communicate with the investigators. They aren't allowed to discuss what happened at mediation. They can't have any impact on the enforcement decision one way or the other. And as to "efficacy," I'm willing to be that what they measure are the number of settlements, not the amount. As to their not being lawyers, mediators aren't supposed to give legal advice or make legal pronouncements. They don't have to be lawyers. Many EEOC mediators were investigators and know better than anyone how the system works.

What is completely missing from all this management-side moaning and groaning is any input from the employee side about what EEOC mediators say when meeting with employees. Mediators are supposed to test both sides with strong questions and doomsday scenarios. EEOC mediators point out to my clients that they could lose their case, that most EEOC cases end up with an "unable to determine" finding (some have even said a "no-cause" finding, even though those no longer exist), that litigation is long and drawn-out and expensive, and that sometimes a losing employee could end up paying fees and costs to the employer. It's the lawyer's job, not the mediator's, to discuss how likely each of these scenarios is with the client and whether settlement is a viable option.

I'd also like to point out my pet peeve from the employee side with EEOC mediators: employers always get the best room. At least here in Miami, EEOC has large, comfy conference rooms with candy and water on the tables, sometimes coffee, where the mediation starts. In every single situation I've encountered, after the initial openings and discussions, when it breaks into caucus, the employee is moved to a different room. That room used to be a tiny and freezing room with a tiny table and no refreshments. Now that they've moved to a different building, employees and their counsel don't even get a table to work on. There's a tiny room with a sofa and some chairs and side tables, and no place to put a laptop or spread out case files.

Does this send a message to employers that they are in disfavor? I think not. I think it sends a terrible message to employees that they are second-class citizens in EEOC mediation, whether it's true or not. I think EEOC mediators should alternate between moving the employer and the employee to the tiny room so it's fair. In a couple of cases, I've insisted upon it and been met with resistance, shock and surprise that I dared shake the status quo.

I'm a huge fan of the EEOC mediation process and EEOC mediators. In Miami at least, they're some of the best mediators I've encountered. That doesn't mean I think they are biased in favor of employees. If they were, they couldn't settle cases. A good mediator tests and pushes both sides, and that's what EEOC mediators do. It would be a travesty if EEOC mediators bowed to management-side pressures by not testing and pushing employers by telling them the worst-case possibilities that maybe their lawyers don't want them to hear.

I challenge Fox Rothschild to survey employee-side firms to find out what worst-case scenarios EEOC mediators are sharing with employees. They won't do it, because it will completely repudiate their claim that EEOC mediators are somehow unfair to employers.

So quit your whining, Fox Rothschild, and enjoy your comfortable large conference room and refreshments while your opponent is stuffed into a tiny room down the hall.

My Readers Change The World! ObamaCare COBRA Gap Fixed

I wrote a few weeks ago about The Little-Known ObamaCare COBRA Catch-22. I thought this issue was so important that I asked AOL Jobs readers for help. I asked you to sign a petition I started to alert the President to this issue. I asked you to tell the President to close the gap. And you came through.

Not only did you sign the petition, but some of you took action to help. Members of the National Employment Lawyers association contacted the Department of Labor to ask for a fix. Forbes found out about this issue and wrote a piece about it. And it worked.

Read my article at AOL Jobs to find out how you can switch from COBRA to ACA until July 1 and how COBRA notices are changing. Thanks so much to everyone who helped with this important change.

6 Ways Same-Sex Marriage Will Affect Florida Employees

There are multiple lawsuits pending in Florida challenging the state's ban on same-sex marriage. There's one in Key West, one in Miami, one in federal court in Tallahassee, and there are probably some more out there. It's almost inevitable that the ban on gay marriage will be overturned here soon.

So why does an employment lawyer care about gay marriage? Here are just some of the laws that will affect Florida employees and employers once gay couples can marry:

1. Florida Civil Rights Act: The Florida statute against discrimination covers marital status. And I'm betting plenty of backwards Florida employers will discriminate when their gay employees get married.
2. Family and Medical Leave Act: Finally, Florida gay couples will be able to take leave to care for a sick spouse.
3. Benefits: Gay spouses will have to be included in employee benefit plans such as insurance and pension. That includes recognizing a same-sex marriage as a qualifying event to enroll a spouse.
4. Tax filing status: Married gay employees will be able to change the number of deductions they claim.
5. Privilege: Right now, I have to boot same-sex partners from confidential attorney-client meetings because there's no privilege between same-sex partners. Once they're married, I can finally include them. I hate, hate, hate having to inform gay couples how backward Florida law is on this, so gay marriage will be a welcome relief.
6. Confidentiality provisions: Many severance and other employment contracts have confidentiality provisions that prohibit telling anyone but immediate family or spouse. Married gay couples will finally be able to share this vital information with partners.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that same-sex marriage will soon be allowed in Florida. I'm absolutely, 100% for it. I look forward to a time when we look back on these times like we look back on school integration - with shame for the years of discrimination, pride that Americans eventually do the right thing and nostalgia.

Who Do I Complain To About Discrimination If I'm HR?

An AOL Jobs reader asked me:

I am a minority female HR professional who has been working in the field for 18 years. I have faced race based discrimination, and sexual harassment continuously during my career. I'm often hired into a management role based on my degree, experience and my SHRM certifications, only to be hidden and given no real responsibilities. Over the years I have learned to identify quickly organizations that offer "Token" positions hoping to fill a quota. These orgs provide no training, support or valid work responsibilities in order to build a case of poor performance.

Unfortunately because I report to HR, following protocol on any harassment claim is nearly impossible. HR staff is notorious for creating the same hostile environments they are hired to protect. HR professionals rarely file complaints for fear of black listing tactics and back door references provided to other HR professionals.

As an employment lawyer have you seen any HR to HR complaints, and do you have any suggestions in regard to HR professionals protecting themselves against the crimes of their peers?

You'd be surprised how many times I have HR people come to me with employment law issues. I have to say, I love representing HR people because you know where the bodies are buried. Employers that don't treat HR professionals like gold are asking for trouble.

So, where does the HR representative go when they're the victim of illegal harassment? For the steps I'd recommend taking, read my column at AOL Jobs.

70% Of Employers Think Your Social Media Posts Are Their Business

A well-respected management-side firm (and sometimes opposing counsel of mine, I should add), Proskauer, released a study they did on social media this week, and I found it quite disturbing from the employee-side point of view. Their key finding:

While nearly 90 percent of companies use social media for business purposes and almost half allow employees to use social media for non-business activities, more than 70 percent of employers report having to take disciplinary action against employees for misuse (a significant uptick from 35 percent in 2012).

While the management-side firm took the results of this study to mean that employers need to crack down more on employee social media use, I had a different reaction, which was:

Holy cow! Seventy percent of employers not only monitor employee social media but are disciplining employees for expressing incorrect views. 

I have to ask, what the hell are we coming to when employers think they have the right to monitor and control employees' opinions expressed on their own time in their own blogs, Facebook pages or other social media. What kinds of things are employers monitoring and cracking down on? Here's what Proskauer says:

• Misuse of confidential information (80 percent)
• Misrepresenting the views of the business (71 percent)
• Inappropriate non-business use (67 percent)
• Disparaging remarks about the business or employees (64 percent)
• Harassment (64 percent)

 Wait, what? Misrepresenting the views of the business? Disparaging remarks about the business or employees? Wow. The nerve of employees having views different from those of their employers or disparaging an abusive boss.

Fortunately, employees who are being subjected to this Big Employer behavior have the NLRB in their court.  NLRB protects most non-supervisory non-government employees from many overbroad social media policys. Some of their recent crackdowns include:

Tossing a disclaimer requirement: Kroger had the brilliant idea of requiring employees to post a disclaimer whenever their posts related to work. "The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the postings, strategies or opinions of The Kroger Co. family of stores."  The NLRB judge tossed the disclaimer requirement with this comment:

An ever increasing amount of social, political, and personal communication, increasingly by people of all ages, takes place online.… A rule that required Kroger employees, who are identified as such, to mouth a disclaimer whenever they conversed with others about “work-related information,” while standing on a street corner, picket line, in church, in a union meeting, or in their home, would neve r— ever — withstand scrutiny. As with traditional, in-person communication, this required online disclaimer has no significant legitimate justification and is, indeed, burdensome to the point that it would have a tendency to chill legitimate section 7 speech.

 Tossing an anti-negativity policy: Hills and Dales General Hospital decided all employees must be happy, or at least not express unhappiness. A NLRB judge tossed policies with this language: “We will not make negative comments about our fellow team members and we will take every opportunity to speak well of each other,”  “We will represent Hills & Dales in the community in a positive and professional manner in every opportunity,” and“We will not engage in or listen to negativity or gossip. We will recognize that listening without acting to stop it is the same as participating.” They stopped short of, "You will be assimilated."

Making an employer rescind policy against discussing executives, customers, suppliers: Valero had to toss its social media policy to satisfy the NLRB. The offending policy about discussing executives, et al. was this:

Policy 1:  Protecting the confidential information of our employees, customers, partners and suppliers is also important.  Do not mention them, including Valero executives, in social media without their permission, and make sure you don't disclose items such as sensitive personal information of others or details related to Valero's business with its customers.

Making an employer rescind policy against abusive, embarrassing posts: Valero also had to toss this policy:

Policy 2:  Do not post anything that is false, misleading, obscene, defamatory, profane, discriminatory, libelous, threatening, harassing, abusive, hateful or embarassing to another person or entity.  Make sure to respect others' privacy.

If you think your employer's social media policy is over the top, or if you're being disciplined for social media use, contact the NLRB or talk to an employment lawyer in your state about your rights.

For more on employer invasion of social media privacy, check out my articles Can Your Employer Demand Your Social Media Passwords and Ten New (And Legal) Ways Your Employer Is Spying On You.

Florida Retail Federation, Republican Legislators Still Want To Legalize Wage Theft

I previously reported that big business in Florida has made three attempts to repeal local efforts to crack down on corporate wage theft. It all started when Miami-Dade County passed an ordinance providing for triple damages for employers who fail to pay wages. First, Big Employer tried to get legislation passed to repeal local laws that punish employers for stealing employee wages. Employees got another victory when Broward County passed its own wage theft ordinance. Then the Florida Retail Federation along with Republican legislators made another failed attempt last year to pass legislation that would legalize wage theft.  Alachua County's new wage theft ordinance just went into effect. Palm Beach County is still working on efforts to combat wage theft.

I thought maybe the Republicans and Big Employer would give up after these losses. Well, they're baaaack. This time, they're going after all of Florida's laws requiring timely payment of wages, under the Orwellian guise of an anti-wage theft law. SB 926 is a parade of horrors for Florida employees. What do the working people of Florida get in this lovely gift for thieving employers?

• Any ordinances passed by counties that are beneficial to employees whose wages were stolen will be gone. All counties can do is try to mediate the dispute to try to get the employee paid, with no enforcement ability.
• The statute of limitations is shortened from 2 years to 1 year (and 2 years is pretty short for many employees who put up with late and partial payment of wages for years based on false promises).
• Employees have to eat their attorney's fees. Right now, prevailing employees get to make thieving employers pay their attorney's fees, which can be as much as or more than the wages owed.
• Counties, cities and towns that steal employee wages get a free pass. I guess government employees are now volunteers if their employer decides to stop paying? 

 Just who is it that benefits from making it more difficult for employees to go after thieving employers? It isn't the taxpayer who works for a living. It isn't legitimate Florida business either. How can any business compete with a company that gets free labor?

The Research Institute on Social and Economic Policy Center for Labor Research and Studies at Florida International University did a study about wage theft in Florida and it's an eye-opener. Here are some of their key findings:

• The primary pillars of Florida’s economy are undermined by widespread theft of employees’ wages. Florida’s key industries have the highest numbers of reported wage violations—tourism, retail trade and construction. 
• In spite of ample evidence of widespread wage theft among low income workers, as of December 2011, the Florida Attorney General had not brought one single civil action to enforce the state’s minimum wage law enacted in 2004. 
• Jobs in both tourism and retail tend to pay relatively low wages. Thus, when there is theft from wages that are already relatively low, employees and their families are likely to suffer even more severely. 
• The wage theft stories collected by community based organizations offer a glimpse into the impact of wage theft on individual employees. They demonstrate the unscrupulous competitive advantage that some employers gain by ignoring the law and causing suffering most often among those who can least afford it. When we consider that many employees who lose wages to wage theft earn at or near minimum wage with no benefits like health insurance we can imagine that the loss of even a small amount of earnings imposes real hardship. 
• This analysis of wage theft cases also raises the question of whether a county and state economy can be healthy and grow while tolerating an unjust business model that avoids contributing to tax revenues. The employers who fail to follow the laws concerning their employees create an unfair business environment that penalizes those who do follow the law. Maintaining a level playing field for businesses is critical to maintaining a competitive business environment and to economic growth. The dishonest business model of practicing wage theft puts law abiding employers at a competitive disadvantage and undermines Florida’s efforts to attract business.
• The data from this report reveals that over $28 million dollars have been recovered by efforts to secure proper payment of wage theft cases in Florida in just two and a half years.
• The Miami-Dade Ordinance fills a gap by handling cases that the Federal Department of Labor cannot. In a Miami Herald article, Will Garnitz, director of the Miami office of the U.S. Department of Labor states, “federal labor law only applies to those business connected directly or indirectly to interstate or foreign commerce. For those people who work in places where the federal law doesn’t apply, where are they supposed to go?” he asked.
• While millions of dollars have been recovered for Florida workers through the Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor in just the last 2 ½ years, it is important to note that not all workers who have experienced wage theft are covered under the agency’s jurisdiction nor do all workers come forth to report this abuse. We know from previous research and the organizations that serve different worker groups that the majority of workers who have experienced wage violations are not likely to report their complaints because they fear retaliation from their employers. They believe they will lose their jobs, and they fear harassment and discrimination, including threats of being reported for deportation.
• Questions about the cost of doing business in Florida and the risks of working in the state will also increase as more evidence of a climate of tolerance for wage theft and its impact on employees and honest employers becomes more widely known.
• These same employers are with impunity breaking laws that not only protect employees, but also are critical to maintaining a fairly competitive business environment so critical in a capitalist society. They also serve to account for tax revenues that many employers practicing wage theft on their employees are circumventing. This dishonest business model puts law abiding employers at a competitive disadvantage.

So, honest employers are hurt by wage theft. The state and local governments are hurt by wage theft. The taxpayers who are working people are hurt by wage theft. Economic development is hurt by wage theft. Can anyone explain to me why Florida Republicans and the Florida Retail Federation are fighting so hard to gut the laws that guarantee Florida employees will be paid for their work?

If you think this is outrageous, take action today.

Call 888-264-6154 and urge your senator to SAY NO TO SB 926

Pregnancy Covered By Florida Civil Rights Act, Supremes Rule

This being Florida, I expect bizarre court cases from time to time. However, the Florida Supreme Court has restored my faith (for now) that sanity will eventually reign. Two years ago, the Third District Court of Appeal, which covers Miami, ruled that pregnancy discrimination was not discrimination based on sex. Fortunately, the Fourth District, covering my home county, ruled the other way. This let the Florida Supremes decide which was right.

They just ruled, and they found that the Florida Civil Rights Act, which covers sex discrimination, but doesn't mention pregnancy, makes pregnancy discrimination illegal. Here's what they said:

Liberally construing the FCRA to further its purpose to ensure that the women of this state are free from discrimination based on their sex, § 760.01(2)(3), Fla. Stat., we conclude that discrimination based on pregnancy is subsumed within the prohibition in the FCRA against discrimination based on an individual’s “sex.” As the Minnesota Supreme Court held regarding its state law that at the time “prohibited discrimination in employment on the basis of sex, but did not specifically mention pregnancy and childbirth,” pregnancy discrimination is subsumed within sex discrimination, as “[a] woman should be no more burdened than a man if she chooses to combine the roles of parent and employee, simply because the woman must bear the child.” Minn. Mining & Mfg. Co. v. State, 289 N.W.2d 396, 398, 400 (Minn. 1979). To conclude that the FCRA does not protect women from discrimination based on pregnancy—a primary characteristic of the female sex—would undermine the very protection provided in the FCRA to prevent an employer from discriminating against women because of their sex.

 So common sense wins the day. Congratulations to every pregnant woman in Florida, who is now protected against discrimination under Florida law. Kudos to the lawyers who fought for the women of Florida and won. You just changed the world for the better.