Robert Iafolla
Fatima Hussein
Bloomberg Law

Retail and food service workers who face verbal abuse and even physical violence from customers objecting to pandemic mask requirements have little legal guarantee that their employers will protect them.

“Mask requirements protect workers and create legal and social norms,” said Terri Gerstein, director of the State and Local Enforcement Project at Harvard University’s Labor and Worklife Program. “Not having mask requirements makes it exponentially harder for businesses to require them, and it sets up workers at retail establishments and in the service industry to have exactly these kinds of confrontations.”... Read more about No Mask, No Service Rules Leave Workers Open to Customer Abuse

Dave Jamieson
HuffPost

Jana Alexander was furloughed from her job at The Container Store when the pandemic began in early spring. With the economy reopening, the company recently invited her back to her old position at her store in Southlake, Texas. But there was a catch.

Alexander would have to sign an arbitration agreement, giving up her right to sue The Container Store in court if she was mistreated. Her welcome-back letter made clear she had little choice in the matter if she wanted to draw a paycheck: “This job offer is contingent upon agreeing to our Mutual...

Read more about These Furloughed Workers Must Sign Arbitration Agreements To Get Their Jobs Back

Anchorage, Alaska (KINY)

The Alaska House State Affairs and Health and Social Services standing committees will hold a joint meeting. The meeting will focus on worker safety during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those testifying will include Administration Commissioner Kelly Tshibaka, Director of Personnel and Labor Relations Kate Sheehan, Labor Standards and Safety Director Joseph Knowles, Alaska Occupational Safety and Health Senior Enforcement Officer Brandon Field, Alaska Occupational Safety and Health Chief of Consultation Elaine Banda, Statewide Director of the National...

Read more about Joint committee meeting Wednesday to discuss worker safety

By: Terri Gerstein and Tanya Goldman

The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) and the Harvard Law School Labor and Worklife Program have released a new toolkit on strategic communication, a critical component of driving compliance with workplace laws. Communicating about agency enforcement, which is critical to informing the public about their rights and responsibilities, is one of the most effective ways to deter violations. These goals are more important than ever as labor enforcement agencies strive to protect workers during the coronavirus pandemic.This resource addresses why agencies should use media and other means of strategic communications and offers suggestions on how to do so. In a moment of reduced state budgets and limited resources, media coverage and strategic communications are a cost-effective way for agencies to multiply their impact and inform workers of their rights.

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... Read more about Protecting Workers through Publicity: Promoting Workplace Law Compliance through Strategic Communication

BY FRANCES COLÓN , TERRI GERSTEIN & DIANE THOMPSON
Morning Consult

The executive order directs agencies to eliminate regulations, to treat corporations with kid gloves and to refrain from enforcement action so long as companies say they’ve tried their best. It’s a staggering diversion of public resources to private corporate interests. Government resources at this moment should be focused on ramping up testing capabilities, ensuring that workplaces are safe and making sure that people can keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. This is precisely what many state and local governments have done, while Trump wants agencies to spend the public’s time and money on weakening law enforcement and gutting protections.

Inadequate workplace regulations and limited enforcement have already caused thousands to sicken and die, while the Labor Department stands by and Trump himself urges workers to return to unsafe working conditions.... Read more about Forget COVID! Trump Says Regulations Are the Problem

Will Stone
NPR

An emergency medicine physician from Washington state has filed a lawsuit to get his job back at a hospital. He was fired in late March after criticizing his hospital's response to the coronavirus pandemic.

OSHA has faced criticism during the pandemic for not being more responsive to worker concerns. That may drive health care workers to take other legal routes when facing retaliation, says Terri Gerstein, a labor attorney who directs the State and Local Enforcement Project at Harvard Law School's Labor and Worklife Program. Gerstein is also a senior fellow at the Economic Policy Institute."It's so important that employers understand that when people raise these kinds of safety concerns, it's not an adversarial thing," she says. "They are trying to make their workplace safer and stem the spread of this horrible disease."

John Lauinger and Karl Hardy 
Bloomberg Law

Employers can expect leniency from federal regulators as they ramp up operations after virus-induced shutdowns, as long as they are able to demonstrate substantial good-faith efforts to adhere to recent updates to agency rules and guidance.

A new executive order President Donald Trump signed this week was intended to boost economic recovery in part by instructing agencies to overlook certain regulatory violations if a business tries to follow federal best practices for preventing the spread of the novel coronavirus.

This section could give employers a significant upper hand in investigations. Certain aspects of it raise concerns for workers, said Terri Gerstein, director of the state and local enforcement project at Harvard’s Labor and Worklife Program. She cited a principle calling for enforcement to be “free of unfair surprise.”

“In the workplace enforcement field, you have to do unannounced inspections and investigations,” said Gerstein, former labor bureau chief in the New York attorney general’s office. “If they’re announced, people get coached, evidence gets destroyed, places get cleaned up.”... Read more about Employers Can Expect Leniency, Not Freedom From U.S. Regulators

By Dave Jamieson
HuffPost

Unionized workers are far more likely to speak out about dangerous working conditions during the coronavirus pandemic. There’s no mystery as to why.

Workers who have weak job protections are fearful to speak up, lest they get punished or even fired. The vast majority of Americans work “at will” ― meaning their employers can get rid of them for almost any reason, as long as it isn’t discriminatory. 

And while workers have a nominal right to refuse dangerous work, the law is weak and puts the burden of proof on employees.

“Protection against unlawful firings is absolutely critical right now,” Gerstein said. “Workers need to be able to speak up without threat of losing their jobs. That’s important for worker safety and for public health.”... Read more about One Way To Protect Workers In A Pandemic: Make It Harder To Fire Them

Jane Flanagan, Terri Gerstein, Patricia Smith
Labor and Work LIfe Program and 
National Employment Law Project

As states consider how to protect public health amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, various questions have arisen about their ability to do so: Specifically, to what degree is state action in the health and safety arena preempted by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act) and federal enforcement by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor (OSHA)? How can states and cities take action to protect workers and members of the public without running into federal preemption issues? This paper provides a basic explanation of OSHA preemption and describes some potential sources of authority and avenues for action by states and localities wishing to protect working people in their jurisdictions.

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Press Release
News Articles: "We can only do so much’? Here’s what experts say Pa., Philly can do to protect workers during the coronavirus." by Juliana Feliciano Reyes, Philadelphia Inquirer, 5/16/20

By Terri Gerstein
NBC News

Noncompete agreements — which typically prohibit an employee from working for a competitor within a certain field and geographic locale, often for 1 to 2 years — were once reserved for high-ranking executives and people who knew highly guarded trade secrets. But in recent years, they began to be imposed willy-nilly on all kinds of workers: medical technicians and dog walkers, journalists and janitors. With little fanfare, modern-day employers have been reinstating an expectation of servitude that should have disappeared long ago.

All of us should be concerned about the rampant growth of noncompetes and how they are hampering the freedom of workers and the economy. Why? For one thing, basic fairness: Just because you work for a company now doesn’t mean it should be able to lock you into that job; people should be able to advance in their lives and careers.

BY TERRI GERSTEIN
The Hill

Coronavirus has laid bare the extent to which the failure of our nation to require paid sick leave has now endangered all of us. Congress needs to urgently pass paid sick leave laws, but states and cities must not wait for that and take action now. In some jurisdictions, this may require making compromises, such as a sunset provision or some aid to small employers.... Read more about America needs paid sick leave laws to stop coronavirus from spreading

By Terri Gerstein and Naomi Walker
Route Fifty

COMMENTARY | State and local officials have initiated many measures to mitigate the consequences of the coronavirus. However, there is still much more for them to do.

The Trump administration has failed the American people to an astonishing extent during the current pandemic crisis. Failed to prepare, failed to take the threat seriously, failed to direct resources where they’re needed, and failed to tell the truth. While Congress has provided some aid to state and local governments in relief packages, given the enormous fiscal challenges already underway, it will not go nearly far enough to help offset the health and economic fallout of Covid-19.

The federal government is the only entity with the sufficient scale and resources to do what’s needed, and yet those efforts continue to be lackluster at best. Ultimately, Congress should pass a new aid package that provides states and localities with $500 billion—more than triple the amount already authorized.... Read more about The Pandemic Response Measures State and Local Governments Should Move On Now

By Terri Gerstein and Jane Flanagan
Economic Policy Institute 

The need to safeguard workers’ physical health and financial stability is more important than ever during the COVID-19 pandemic. State and local labor enforcement agencies are critical to such efforts, particularly given the federal administration’s abdication of leadership on worker-protection issues. Yet responding to the current crisis will require state and local labor agencies to quickly reorient to a new reality and repurpose their staff and routine functions in new and creative ways. As former state enforcers, we share the following ideas about how such agencies might utilize tested and effective strategic enforcement strategies and tools to respond to this moment.