(Podcast) California Employment News: Fair Chance Act – A Brief Overview of Employment Criminal Background Checks
The Risks in Background Checks
AGG Talks: Background Screening - Ban the Box and Fair Chance Hiring Laws: The Year in Review
#WorkforceWednesday: COVID-19 Restrictions Tighten, NYC Fair Chance Act, Biden's Budget - Employment Law This Week®
Employment Law Now III-50 - A 50th Birthday Celebration Episode
The employment law landscape has seen widespread changes on the federal and state levels in recent years. In light of what is poised to be years of even more changes, now is an opportune time to re-examine the basics of a...more
Hiring in Los Angeles County has changed due to the implementation of the Fair Chance Ordinance. This ordinance, designed to promote fair employment opportunities for individuals with criminal records, introduces new...more
General Overview of the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance -California has long been at the forefront of promoting equal employment opportunity for individuals with criminal histories. Statewide laws such as the Fair...more
In recent years, advocates and lawmakers have been pushing to expand the reach of “ban-the-box” measures designed to remove job barriers for individuals with criminal convictions....more
A growing number of states and municipalities have passed “fair chance” laws that, to varying degrees, prohibit employers from inquiring into a job applicant’s criminal background during the hiring process or restrict...more
Employers with operations in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, must comply with a new and expansive anti-discrimination ordinance that took effect June 1. Our FP attorneys developed this series of FAQs to address all employment...more
A large convenience store chain recently learned about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s intention to challenge how employers use arrest and conviction records to make hiring decisions....more
After more than a year of administrative activity pertaining to California’s Fair Chance Act (FCA), the California Civil Rights Council issued final modifications to the FCA’s regulations (the “Revised Regulations”). The...more
Chicago has amended its “Ban the Box” Ordinance (the “Ordinance”) to further align with Illinois law. The Ordinance, which originally took effect in 2015, provides protections for both prospective and current employees....more
On June 10, 2021, Governor Ned Lamont signed into law Connecticut’s “Clean Slate” law, Public Act No. 21-32. The Clean Slate law became effective January 1, 2023, and it provides for the automatic erasure of certain criminal...more
A growing number of states and municipalities are restricting the types of inquiries employers can make during hiring, creating concerns with what employers can include or must include on job applications and job postings. ...more
An overwhelming majority of states have adopted what is widely known as “ban-the-box” laws or policies that generally prohibit employers from inquiring about an applicant’s criminal background until later in the hiring...more
On November 15, 2021, the city of Des Moines, Iowa, passed a “ban-the-box” law that will limit employer inquiries and background checks into an applicant’s criminal history until after a conditional offer of employment....more
Q: Ban the Box has been around for several years now, and I know at least one city in Iowa implemented local regulations about background checks. What is the status in Iowa?...more
The federal Fair Chance to Compete for Jobs Act of 2019 (Fair Chance Act) officially took effect this week on December 20, 2021. The law was signed two years ago as Section 1123 of the National Defense Authorization Act for...more
In this episode, AGG partner and co-chair of the firm’s Data Privacy Practice, Kevin L. Coy, and Data Privacy associate, Erin E. Doyle, discuss the federal Fair Chance to Compete for Jobs Act, provide an overview of state and...more
In December 2021, covered federal contractors may start seeing new or amended solicitations and contract clauses that prohibit them from inquiring into job applicants’ criminal backgrounds. The federal Fair Chance to Compete...more
2021 continues the trend of increasing regulation of the workplace by state and local governments. Although it is not possible to discuss all state and local laws, this update provides an overview of recent and upcoming...more
Companies that hire employees and engage independent contractors in California should brace for a significant slowdown in background checks that include criminal record searches in California state courts....more
In July 2021, Maine enacted a new “ban-the-box” law that limits employer inquiries into an applicant’s criminal history. Under the new law, entitled “An Act Relating to Fair Chance in Employment,” employers are prohibited...more
The Iowa Supreme Court has ruled that Iowa state law preempts the City of Waterloo’s restriction on employers’ use of applicants’ criminal record history when making hiring decisions. Other aspects of the ordinance, however,...more
The California Court of Appeal has ruled that date of birth and/or a driver’s license number cannot be used to identify individuals in an electronic search of the criminal index of court records. All of Us or None v....more
Seyfarth Synopsis: On June 18, 2021, the Iowa Supreme Court upheld a portion of the Waterloo, Iowa ban-the-box law’s restrictions on “when” employers can inquire about criminal history, but struck down restrictions on “what”...more
If the chaos of COVID wiped out all your memory regarding recent employment law changes, a short history lesson is probably in order. Nationally, a number of cities, states, counties, and municipalities decided to change...more
In the fall of 2019, the Waterloo, Iowa City Council approved the state’s first “Ban the Box” ordinance. Generally speaking, that ordinance made it illegal for any employer to ask about an applicant’s criminal history on a...more