News & Resources Category: Resources

Approximately one year ago the Pennsylvania State Legislature passed a law entitled Construction Industry Employee Verification Act.  This is a reminder that the statute is now in effect as of October 7, 2020. 

The Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry, in announcing the Department’s new overtime rule, projected that up to 251,000 or more people employed in Pennsylvania could soon see overtime compensation in their paychecks where there was none before.

In a recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision, the Court has given the green light to employees to file certain retaliation claims with a state court under the Pennsylvania Whistleblower Law without first filing a charge or complaint with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission.

While contractors move quickly to sanitize their workplaces, seeking to protect their employees, customers, and guests from the Coronavirus, diligently following directives from the CDC, no amount of sanitizing can insulate contracting businesses from potential negative outcomes and costly unprecedented and unpredictable impacts caused by the virus.

Most everyone has seen the classic 1939 movie, The Wizard of Oz.  In one scene along the yellow brick road in the dark forest, Dorothy, the Tin Man, and the Scarecrow talk of the scariest things they might encounter, repeating their greatest fears with the line “Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!” as they scurry through the forest.  If Dorothy and her sidekicks were here today, they might be heard to say Lions and Tigers and Bears, and COVID-19, Oh My!

In October of 2010, the Pennsylvania Legislature passed the Construction Workplace Misclassification Act.  The purpose of the Act was to prohibit construction industry employers from classifying people who worked for them as independent contractors, as opposed to employees, and to prosecute those employers who misclassified such people.  Though the law has been in effect now for nearly 10 years, it has not spurred many prosecutions. However, recently, the Pennsylvania Attorney General, along with the District Attorney for Delaware County, announced a joint pilot program aimed at combating the misclassification of construction workers, putting Pennsylvania contractors on notice that they intend to prosecute contractor violators.