I recommend employers listen to a podcast from Jason Storipan of Stark & Stark concerning Attendance Control Issues for employees.  Please remember that laws do vary from state to state but much of the information given in Jason’s podcast is applicable to all employers even if you are not located in New Jersey.

If you are developing policies and procedures to deal with employee attendance issues be sure to contact your employment lawyer and keep in mind two important ideals:  Fairness and Consistency.

If you treat people fairly and in a consistent manner your liability risks from an employee lawsuit decrease dramatically.  May seem like common sense but as George Will said, "This is an age in which one cannot find common sense without a search warrant." 

I invite you to check out a special Memorial Day Blawg Review #110 from Norman Gregory Fernandez of Biker Law Blog.  Fernandez describes Memorial Day this way:

You see Memorial Day is a day that is set aside each year to honor those men and women who have lost their lives in the Service of the United States of America.

To honor these men and women is to honor not only the United States of America, but to honor the freedom for which the United States of America stands.

Above all, Memorial Day is a day is to remember those brave souls whose willing self sacrifice has given us all a chance to live free in the greatest nation on earth. God bless those men and women who have died in the service of the Untied States of America.

It is hard to say it any better than that. 

Governor Culver recently signed into law a bill providing $4 million in funding for Iowa’s Targeted Small Business Program.  To qualify under the program a business must have sales of less than $3 million and be at least 51% owned, operated and managed by women, minorities or persons with disabilities.

If you have a business that may qualify under the program you can receive your certification through the Iowa Department of Inspection and Appeals or the Iowa Department of Transportation.  A qualified recipient will be eligible to receive up to $50,000 for start-up expenses.

Iowa – the new Hollywood?  It may sound crazy but Governor Culver and lawmakers are hoping to snare more filmmakers with the passage of a new law that provides incentives for movie producers who create their films in Iowa. 

The Iowa Film Promotion Act (House File 892) offers 25 percent tax credits for local filmmaking expenses and overall investments for films shot in Iowa with budgets of more than $100,000.  Details of the program have yet to be determined but there will be an application / certification process followed by a claims submission process.  If you are a filmmaker or investor interested in these incentives please contact the Iowa Film Office for more information.

The new law allows Iowa to compete with surrounding states that offer similar incentives.  It will also have another positive impact.  Young, aspiring filmmakers now have a reason to stay in the state rather than take off to Southern California, New York or Chicago.  According to an article in the Des Moines Register, that is just what three young filmmakers intend to do. 

With the new law and upcoming movie releases like the The Final Season, maybe the rise of the film industry in Iowa has just begun.  Baseball movies could be our ticket.  The Cityview reports another Iowa movie called "Sugar" is planned about a Domican baseball player.  Of course most people remember "The Field of Dreams" which is one of the all time great baseball movies and its famous dialogue, "Is this Heaven? No, it’s Iowa."  The movie site in Dyersville still remains open to the public to this day.  

I wonder if it is too big of a leap to go from lawyer to blogger to screenwriter?

*I originally wrote this post for IowaBiz.com.

Iowa Governor Chet Culver signed a bill today expanding housing and civil rights protections to the LGBT community.  In signing the bill Governor Culver said,

“It is unacceptable that members of the LGBT community are denied the same protections as every other Iowan, and that is why I made a promise to do whatever necessary to grant these individuals the rights they deserve. I am happy to say that today, we keep this promise. This legislation will guarantee that no individual, regardless of race, age, gender, sexual orientation, or gender identity, is denied the protections of state government.”

If you are an Iowa employer be sure to talk with your employment lawyer concerning your employee handbooks and anti-discrimination policies.  It is important to review your handbooks to make sure your anti-discrimination policies now cover sexual orientation and gender identity.  Failing to include such provisions in your policies could result in increased liability.

With Memorial Day coming up next Monday I thought it appropriate to touch on Military Leave Laws and Veteran Discrimination.

A law known as the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) protects the rights of military service members to take a leave of absence to take a leave of absence from their civilian jobs for active military service and to return to their jobs with accrued seniority and other protections.

Some of the core protections include (a couple of nice overviews are here and here):

  1. Protection against discrimination with prior, current or even possibly future military service;
  2. Protection against retaliation for trying to enforce USERRA;
  3. Reemployment rights upon return from military service including certain protections from discharge;
  4. Continuation of benefits that are based upon seniority or length of employee service;
  5. Certain preservation of other benefits while absent and upon return of service.

However, as the Employment Advisory blog points out about a recent 11th Circuit decision involving USERRA, the rights of the military service members do have their limits.

Employers are required to provide notice to persons entitled to the rights and benefits under USERRA.  In Iowa you can find information on how to obtain your USERRA poster by going to the Iowa Workforce Development Web site.

I generally recommend that new business clients visit with their accountant before deciding which type of business entity to form.  Even if I were to make my recommendation it is helpful to get the advice of the professional who will actually being doing the taxes. 

I saw a good post today on some of the potential tax considerations you should consider before you form a C corporation.  It’s not a lemon of a post (you’ll see why).  Please check out Joe Kristan’s post on IowaBiz.com for more information. 

Larger_photo_harvick Sixteen-year-old racing phenom Joey Logano accomplished what Jimmie Johnson could not this past weekend.  He raced past the reigning 2007 Daytona 500 Kevin Harvick to win the NASCAR Grand National Featherlite Coaches 200.  Harvick earned a $1 million payday Saturday night, winning the Nextel All-Star Challenge but didn’t have enough left to hold off the young Logano.

The largest crowd in Iowa Speedway history – estimated paid attendance 24,741 -witnessed terrific side-by-side racing as Logano and Harvick changed the lead 15 times during the race. Sidebyside_racing

The only people happier than Logano had to be the Iowa Speedway management and Rusty Wallace.  Harvick had lots of great things to say about the track despite the loss.  His most encouraging comments came when he said the Speedway would be a great facility for the Craftsman Trucks and Busch Series.  The Nextel Cup series schedule is a little full but overall Harvick’s comments had to be music to Newton’s ears. 

With nearly 25,000 attending a Busch Grand National race it ought to be an awesome crowd for the upcoming Indy Racing League.  Not sure if any tax breaks were involved with the Speedway (a little dig Joe) but it sure is great to see that kind of development in Iowa and the enthusiasm exhibited by the fans.  It was great fun and I highly recommend you grab a seat for the upcoming Indy race on June 24th.  Even if you are not a big race fan it is sure to be a great time. 

For more on the action last Sunday check out Doug Mitchell’s post on Moments of Clarity.

P.S. That’s me in the green shirt behind as Harvick gets into his car before the race.  Thanks to Dave Slinker for the pictures.  Dave and I reported for the Iowa Sports Connection about the race.

Larger_photo_harvick_2

Many employers today are conducting do-it-yourself background checks by surfing search engines and other social network sites such as Faceboook and MySpace.  I have discussed the risks and liabilities of utilizing such background checks in the past.

Another reason to be careful before using search engines or social network sites is "cyber slamming".  It occurs when defamatory statements are made about individuals on the Internet.  The Internet is full of sites and chat rooms where anyone can make postings.  Some of these may be anonymous comments that are not reliable.

Recently I was contacted by a prospective client who complained someone was writing defamatory and damaging comments about them on the Internet.  While a lawsuit is a consideration another option may be a service from ReputationDefender which attempts to remove such harmful comments for a fee and also provides monitoring services for clients.

I also suggest you follow this tip from Susan Cartier Liebel:

The same way  you check your credit report on an annual basis, Google your name and your company’s name on a weekly basis to see if there is any information circulating that you find is potentially threatening to you.  You must stay proactive and aggresively stamp out any malicious virus threatening to infect and destroy your good name on the internet.   

Like so many things from a legal prospective, protecting your reputation on the Internet requires you to be proactive.

The Better Business Bureau warns businesses across the U.S. and Canada of a spoofing scam using the BBB name and a false BBB email address to entice recipients to access potentially damaging hyperlinks. 

The most recent e-mail has a false return address of consumer-complaints@bbb.org and a phishing hyperlink citing a BBB complaint case number, for example, "DOCUMENTS FOR CASE #BBA749BED0". These links actually direct access to a subdirectory of the hacked firm’s website where users are asked to download documents related to the complaint. The download is actually an executable file that is believed to be some form of a computer virus.

All recipients are advised that any e-mail from the consumer-complaints@bbb.org address is not coming from any BBB and should be considered counterfeit. The BBB strongly encourages recipients of any such message to delete the message immediately without clicking on the "DOCUMENTS FOR CASE" links.

So be careful and delete any such messages.  If you receive a complaint from the Better Business Bureau you will generally be notified by letter and you will have some advance warning of the complaint.