Management Update

Volume 8, Issue 7

July 2019

Bad News, It Looks Like At Least Two of Texas' Paid Sick Leave Ordinances Are About to Go Into Effect

You may recall that San Antonio, Dallas and Austin have enacted ordinances requiring employers to provide employees with paid sick leave. We thought that the Texas legislature was going to enact a law prohibiting such local ordinances. Bad news, the Texas legislative session closed with the Bill still stuck in committee. This means that the paid sick leave ordinances in San Antonio and Dallas are scheduled to take effect on August 1, 2019. Absent a Special Session, there is no other procedural method to revive the Bill, and the Texas Legislature will not have an opportunity to address the sick leave preemption issue until the next session in January 2021.

A court may intervene and enjoin one of more of the ordinances, but it would have to move quickly, with the San Antonio and Dallas ordinances are slated to take effect on August 1, 2019. There is currently an injunction in place preventing the enforcement of the Austin ordinance. The City of Austin has appealed to the Texas Supreme Court, where even if the court decides to review the appeal, a final decision is still months away. T o read the full article, click here.

What Should You Do If You Receive an SSA "No-Match" Letter

The SSA resumed the practice of issuing Employer Correction Request Notices (AKA “no-match letters”) late last year. These letters notify an employer when the information submitted on an employee’s W-2, such as the SSN, does not match the SSA’s records. Receipt of a no-match letter should trigger an employer to take a number of actions and, just as importantly, to refrain from doing certain things.

I am currently assisting several clients work through the process of dealing with one or more no-match letters. The process is not extremely complicated, but there are several points at which an employer can create liability for themselves. The Department of Justice has provided us with a handy list of Dos and Don’ts to use in this process.

To read the full article, click here.

Supreme Court Holds EEOC Charge-Filing Requirement is Not Jurisdictional

Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Fort Bend County v. Davis that the filing of a Charge with the EEOC, or a similar state deferral agency, is not a jurisdictional prescription to the filing of a lawsuit under Title VII.

This does not mean that a plaintiff does not need to file a Charge before filing suit. Rather, it means that if a plaintiff fails to do so, the defendant must object to this failure in a timely manner. In the past, defendants could argue that the failure to file a Charge was a jurisdictional prerequisite to filing suit at any time during the litigation and ask that the Title VII claims be thrown out.

Supreme Court’s Decision

In the Davis case, the Court held that because the Defendant did not raise the argument that the Plaintiff had not timely filed a Charge until years into the litigation, the Defendant had waived any objection to the Plaintiff’s failure to exhaust administrative remedies. Unfortunately, the Court did not indicate a deadline by which such a defense must be raised.

To read the full article, click here.