Labor & Employment Law Update

In an unprecedented fashion, an arbitrator recently issued an award limiting the scope of Public Act 095-0490, otherwise known as the Substitutes Act. In doing so, the City of Mattoon successfully fought, through Amundsen Davis attorneys Julie Proscia and Carlos Arévalo, and won the right to close their ambulance service. So why is this award important? This award now serves as a basis for municipalities to be able to have the autonomy to review their scope of services and determine which services are best for their community as opposed to the scope of services being dictated by ...

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled this morning that employers can enforce class action waivers included in employment-related arbitration agreements. An arbitration agreement is a contract through which an employee and an employer agree in advance to resolve any disputes that may arise through binding arbitration rather than in court. The issue before the Supreme Court was whether an employer could enforce an arbitration agreement provision requiring each employee to arbitrate his or her disputes individually rather than collectively or as part of a class action. The Court ruled ...

YouTube’s experience on April 3, 2018, in which a non-employee with no direct link to the company entered the workplace and started shooting a firearm at employees, highlighted concern for an “active shooter” scenario in the workplace.

As a result of increased gun violence, state legislatures have been pushing gun control legislation, including laws that would ban bump stocks and high capacity magazines, raise the minimum age to buy a gun to 21, or even ban people from carrying, keeping, bearing, transporting or possessing an assault weapon. Some proposed legislation is not ...