9th Circuit: Garcetti Poses Mixed Question of Law and Fact

Scales Thanks to Ross Runkel for providing this summary of an interesting new Garcetti public employee free speech case, Posey v. Lake Pend (9th Cir. 10/15/2008), considering whether the determination of if an employee is speaking pursuant to his official duties is a question of law or fact.  Of course, this is an important question because it goes to whether these cases can be disposed of by the court on summary judgment:

Posey sued the public employer, asserting a claim for 1st Amendment retaliation.  The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the employer.  The 9th Circuit reversed.

The court framed the primary issue on appeal as “whether, following the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 IS 410 (2006), the inquiry into the protected status of speech in a First Amendment retaliation claim remains a question of law properly decided at summary judgment or instead now presents a mixed question of fact and law.”

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When Should Records Be Sealed in Employment Discrimination Cases?

Sealed_record Thanks to friend of the blog, Jack Sargent, for pointing me to this fascinating dispute before the U.S Supreme Court now concerning the sealing of a record in an employment discrimination case.

From the reporters committee for freedom of the press blog:

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press today filed a brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review a decision that allowed all records in a federal employment discrimination case to be hidden from the public. The Reporters Committee filed the brief on behalf of itself and 29 other leading media organizations.

The friend-of-the-court brief was filed in support of The Legal Intelligencer, which petitioned the Supreme Court for review after the Third Circuit Court of Appeals rejected its request to intervene in Doe v. C.A.R.S. Protection Plus Inc. The newspaper sought to unseal the docket and record in Doe, a case in which the plaintiff claimed she was wrongly fired because she had an abortion.

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The Impact of the Economic Collapse on U.S. Employee Benefits

Medical_symbol2 One of the less followed stories during the economic collapse is its potential impact on the employee benefits of employees in the United States.  Not only will workers lose a substantial part of their pensions because of the falling price of securities in their 401(k) accounts, but there might even be a bigger problem discussed in this article from Columbus Business First:

As a national debate over the future of the nation’s health-care system swirls, a new report from a liberal think tank indicates fewer working-age Americans, including Ohioans, are being covered under employer-sponsored health plans.

A briefing paper from the Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute, titled The Erosion of Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance, shows employer coverage for workers and their families dropped for the seventh consecutive year. About 63 percent of Americans, or 164.5 million, under age 65 were covered in 2007, about 3 million workers fewer than in 2000, during which about 68 percent were covered.

Employer-sponsored insurance coverage for working-age Ohioans fell at a similar rate over the decade. Last year, 6.8 million Ohioans, or nearly 69 percent, were covered by their employers, down more than 400,000 from 7.2 million, or 74 percent, six years earlier.

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