Resources

Non-Fungible Tokens

A non-fungible token (“NFT”) is a non-interchangeable unit of data which can be sold and traded. NFTs come in varying forms, though commonly, they take the form of a simple .jpeg image. Popular auction houses, such as Sotheby’s and Christie’s, have recently reached hit numbers due to NFT sales.

On March 21, 2022, the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry (DOLI), Safety and Health Codes Board (Board) voted to revoke the Virginia Standard for Infectious Disease Prevention of the SARS-CoV-2 Virus That Causes COVID-19 (the “Permanent Standard”).

What Happens if my Employees Move Out of a HUBZone After Certification? What Happens If my Business Merges with Another Company?

Once certified, a HUBZone contractor must monitor the residences of its employees to ensure compliance with the Small Business Administration’s regulations. Because employees move – and not necessarily with the approval of their employers! – the regulations allow for some flexibility once an employee establishes a residence in a HUBZone and later moves.

As summarized in a recent blog post about COVID-19 workplace facemask requirements, Virginia was one of the first states in the U.S. to implement comprehensive emergency temporary COVID-19 workplace safety regulations, with a permanent set of regulations (“Permanent Standard”) implemented in September 2021, by the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry’s (“DOLI”) Safety and Health Codes Board (the “Board”).  Now, with COVID-19 transmission rates, hospitalizations and deaths sharply declining across the Commonwealth and a new occupant in the governor’s mansion in Richmond, the Board has begun the regulatory process that seems likely to lead to the repeal of the Permanent Standard in the not-too-distant future.

Intended to fuel small business growth in historically underutilized geographic areas, the government set a goal of awarding at least 3% of federal contract dollars to HUBZone certified companies that operate and employ residents of those areas each year. The program is beneficial for small businesses because, once certified, contracting officers may make sole-source awards to HUBZone contractors, and can receive a price preference on full and open competition.

Back in July 2020, Virginia became one of the first states in the U.S. to implement comprehensive emergency temporary COVID-19 workplace safety regulations. Then, on September 8, 2021, the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry’s (“DOLI”) Safety and Health Codes Board (the “Board”) approved a permanent set of regulations governing workplace safety standards and disease prevention relating to COVID-19 (the “Permanent Standard”), which became effective upon approval by then-Governor Ralph Northam. Mandatory use of cloth facemasks at work during times of significant or high rates COVID-19 community transmission was one of the COVID-19 safety hallmarks under the Permanent Standard.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (“OSHA”) on-again-off-again COVID workplace safety regulations requiring businesses with 100 or more employees to mandate COVID vaccines for those employees or require face masks and weekly testing (the “ETS”) are back on, reinstated by the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a decision issued on December 17, 2021. The Sixth Circuit’s decision lifted the November 6, 2021 stay issued by the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The stay barred OSHA from enforcing the ETS pending full judicial review, finding that OSHA had exceeded the scope of its regulatory authority in issuing the ETS, in response to multiple lawsuits brought by private employers, labor unions, state governments and individual citizens across the country. Those lawsuits had been consolidated into a single proceeding before the Sixth Circuit, under federal multi-district litigation rules.

In Episode 14 of Employment Law in Focus, attorney Doug Taylor discusses the new amended COVID-19 workplace safety regulations that went into effect on September 8, 2021, in Virginia.

In light of recent directives from the Biden Administration, an increasing number of employers with COVID-19 vaccine mandates will be faced with the question of what to do if an employee refuses to get vaccinated.

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (“Title IX”) is straightforward in its prohibition:

[N]o person shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination [in] any academic, extracurricular, . . or other education program or activity[.]

The statute has unquestionably transformed high school and college athletics for females in the U.S. For example, before Title IX was passed , about 310,000 women and girls played college and high school interscholastic sports. Now, more than three million females participate in school sports.

The rapid evolution of Virginia workplace laws continues with the Virginia General Assembly’s passage of HB 1848 , which extends employee workplace protections under the Virginia Human Rights Act (“VHRA”) to include a prohibition on discrimination against individuals with disabilities. The VHRA is applicable to Virginia employers with six or more employees.

Effective July 1, 2021, the VHRA requires employers to engage in the familiar, ADA-like, good faith interactive process to determine whether there are reasonable accommodations available that will allow an otherwise qualified individual with a disability to perform their job.

In our blog posts last year, we chronicled the sea change in employment laws that has been underway in Virginia, in areas such as misclassifying employees as independent contractors and workplace discrimination . Virginia has had a well-earned reputation as a state with workplace rules and regulations typically favoring businesses over employees. However, the Commonwealth has been pulled in the other direction in recent legislative sessions, with some now considering the state to be more aligned with progressive jurisdictions like California and Massachusetts, with more than a dozen employee-friendly pieces of legislation going into effect in 2020.

With a significant percentage of individuals now fully vaccinated against COVID-19, businesses are beginning to reopen or expand in-the-office activity in Northern Virginia and across the Commonwealth. On May 28, 2021, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issued updated and expanded technical assistance targeted to answer some of the frequently asked questions concerning COVID-19 vaccinations in the employment context.

Ar*bi*tra*tion – is a procedure in which the parties opt for a private dispute resolution, instead of going to court, by submitting the dispute to one or more arbitrators to make a binding decision.

Certain businesses routinely utilize employment arbitration agreements, finding them to be an effective means of dealing with the uncertainties of workforce disputes that may arise during employment or after it ends.

A recent decision of a panel of the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals offers an important reminder for employers: There is potential legal risk in ignoring or brushing off an employee who comes forward with complaints of sexual harassment by a supervisor — even when the employee and supervisor are both of the same sex. Glenn Industrial Group, Inc., a North Carolina-based provider of underwater inspection and repair services to utility companies learned that lesson last week.

In today’s global economy, it has become increasingly common for companies based in the United States to engage workers who live in other countries to provide services as independent contractors. This practice has become even more prevalent during the COVID-19 pandemic with the broad expansion of virtual work.

Companies can save money hiring independent contractors because they do not have to provide benefits, office space, or equipment to contractors or pay taxes on compensation paid to contractors. Companies can often save even more money engaging contractors from other countries due to lower labor costs.

President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (the “ARPA”) into law on March 11, 2021. The $1.9 trillion relief package contains several provisions that will impact employers, including a requirement that employers provide “assistance eligible individuals” (defined below) with fully subsidized COBRA continuation coverage premiums for the time period of April 1, 2021 through September 30, 2021, with such costs to be offset by a refundable credit against the employer’s share of Medicare tax under a newly added Internal Revenue Code section.

President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (the “ARPA”) into law on March 11, 2021. The $1.9 trillion relief package contains several provisions that will impact employers, including a requirement that employers provide “assistance eligible individuals” (defined below) with fully subsidized COBRA continuation coverage premiums for the time period of April 1, 2021 through September 30, 2021, with such costs to be offset by a refundable credit against the employer’s share of Medicare tax under a newly added Internal Revenue Code section.

With COVID-19 vaccines becoming more readily available in the U.S. and a larger percentage of individuals having been vaccinated, businesses are beginning to reopen or expand in-the-office activity in Northern Virginia and across the Commonwealth. Businesses, both large and small, should be giving serious thought to the COVID-19 workplace safety policies and procedures that all are required to have in place to achieve appropriate workplace safety for employees and customers whenever re-opening day arrives.

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) continues to focus considerable enforcement attention on when employees must be paid for travel time between home and their office or worksite under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Construction and building trades companies remain at the forefront of the enforcement efforts of the DOL’s Wage and Hour Division (“WHD”), as exemplified by the recent consent judgment that ended the lawsuit brought by the DOL against AWP, Inc., a company that provides traffic control “flagging” services for temporary construction work zones.