Attention Employers and HR!!!!

Cuomo signs sexual harassment law- as we first reported on June 19, 2019, A08421 passed both houses and now Cuomo has made it the law of the State of New York.

• Changes the severe or pervasive standard of harassment to a very low standard of more than petty slights or trivial inconveniences;
• Eliminates part of the Faragher/Ellerth affirmative defense to a lawsuit by making the fact that the employee did not make a complaint about the harassment to the employer not determinative as to liability;
• Extends protection for non-employees in the workplace to all protected classes;
• Allows courts to award attorney's fees on all claims of employment discrimination, and allow for punitive damages in employment discrimination cases against private employers;
• Provide that the Human Rights Law is to be construed liberally for remedial purposes, regardless of how federal laws have been construed;
• Prohibit mandatory arbitration clauses for discrimination claims;
• Prohibit non-disclosure agreements in any settlement for a claim of discrimination, unless it's the complainant's preference;
• Provide that any term or condition in a non-disclosure agreement is void if it prohibits the complainant from initiating or participating in an agency investigation or disclosing facts necessary to receive public benefits;
• Require that employees be notified that non-disclosure agreements in employment contracts cannot prevent them from talking to the police, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the State Division of Human Rights or a similar local entity, or a lawyer;
• Extend the authority of the Attorney General to prosecute certain civil and criminal cases of discrimination against all protected classes;
• Require the Department of Labor and the Division of Human Rights to evaluate the impact of the model sexual harassment prevention policy every four years and update the policy as needed;
• Require any term or condition in a non-disclosure agreement be provided in writing to all parties, in plain English and the primary language of the complainant;
• Require the commissioner of the Labor Department to prepare templates of the model policy in languages other than English;
• Require every employer to provide employees with their sexual harassment policy in English or their primary language when they are hired and during training; and
• Extend the statute of limitations to file a sexual harassment complaint with the Division of Human Rights from one year to three years.

October 9th, 2019 is the deadline for all employees to complete the sexual harassment prevention training. Newsday recently interviewed Andrew Lieb, Esq. of Lieb Compliance discussing the requirements and solution.

Click here to read the full article. 

When you shoot the messenger, don’t miss.

One month ago, the Legally Speaking column “The End of Prepaid Seasonal Rentals” hit, and real estate brokers have been reaching out ever since. The article explained that the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019 prohibits prepaid seasonal rentals and requires that tenants be billed monthly for rent. After reading the headline, brokers instantly jumped on it. They questioned the veracity of the story, the applicability of the law and everything in between. Now I respond while detailing five false assertions made in response to the article.

Today, August, 9, 2019, Governor Cuomo signed A4204 into law.

A new residential rental law exposes landlords to suit for checking their prospective tenant’s eviction history. This new law provides, at Real Property Law §227-f, that “[n]o landlord of a residential premises shall refuse to rent or offer a lease to a potential tenant on the basis that the potential tenant was involved in a past or pending landlord tenant action or summary proceeding…” In fact, the law contains a rebuttable presumption that a violation has occurred, which presumption arises when a landlord requests such “information from a tenant screening bureau… or otherwise inspect[s] court records.” Furthermore, the law expressly authorizes the attorney general to prosecute landlords for violations of the law and provides for statutory penalties to be recovered against violating landlords. Landlords—don’t check your prospective tenant’s eviction history if you don’t want to get sued by the attorney general.

Read the full article by Andrew Lieb, Esq. published in Dan's Papers here.