Employment

When NJ truck drivers, office workers, medical staff and others are forced by the employer to work long hours as a condition of their job, the employee may wonder if this is legal. Driver fatigue and public safety are an issue for all. State and Federal Codes and Regulations regarding driving were written not just for the safety of the driver, but for others on the road and the public in general. If you are a NJ truck driver and your employer forced you to drive without first taking 10 consecutive hours off duty*; or your employer does not schedule your work so that a driver may drive only during a period of 14 consecutive hours after coming on duty following 10 consecutive hours off duty*; or your employer forces you to drive more than  a total of 11 hours during the 14-hour period specified above;* and you complained and you employer retaliated against you, you may have a valid whistleblower claim. [ *Note: quoted from statute in effect on May 8, 2019, and may be subject to change at any time.

At times, it is just one person who creates a hostile work environment for older workers.

In other situations, the age discrimination is the result of a corporate mindset. This might happen when there has been a change of management who wants new “branding” and wants to replace older workers with younger ones as a business strategy. Businesses have become more legally sophisticated over the years and are less likely to have a mass termination of the older staff and quickly hirer younger replacements to promote a new branding. In attempts to avoid being sued for age discrimination, they sometimes set out on a course to later attempt to prove that it was dissatisfaction with the employee’s quality of work or some other bogus reason that the termination decision was reached by management, and that age had nothing to do with the termination.

New Jersey's Wynona Moore Lipman was known as the original Steel Magnolia throughout the NJ legislature and was the first Black woman elected as a New Jersey Senator. Born in 1923 in Georgia as Wynona Moore, but settling when an adult in New Jersey, she acted with calm reserve but never backed down from a political battle for just causes, which earned her her reputation as the "Steel Magnolia". She held ranking positions on important Senate committees, including the budget and appropriations committees and those dealing with a broad range of human services. She is distinguished as being the longest-serving member of the Senate, serving nine terms representing the 29th Legislative District. She was an out spoken advocate in particular for protection for women and children.

An employee’s reporting of a business “irregularity” could be considered legally “protected conduct” in some instances.

Whistleblower claims under New Jersey Law and certain federal laws can include instances when an employee reports certain business “irregularities” to their employer and then in response the employer commits what is known as an “adverse act” against the employee, such as a demotion, transfer to less desirable position and distant location, or firing. An employee’s reporting of business irregularities may be legally “protected conduct” in some instances thereby prohibiting the employer from retaliating against the employee.

Whistleblower retaliation litigation can be lengthy and complex. This firm, Hope A.

Jessie Redmon Fauset was a New Jersey native and an innovator who advocated for new models for black racial characters in literature. As a female black editor, writer and educator in the first third of the 20^th century, her literary talents impacted the evolving 1920's Harlem Renaissance to elevate and expand public perceptions of the American Black experience to images beyond that of a life of servitude. Decades ahead of other authors, she was a literary neoteric whose themes frequently focused on giving a voice to black working professionals, which was generally a new concept to the broad American public at that time. Her writings not only portrayed nuances of difficult black middle class daily struggles, but the reality of a wider spectrum of black life styles in the 1920's. Her authorship gave hope and promise to blacks who had not yet made it to the middle class and addressed issues of race and feminism.

April is Black Women's History Month. New Jersey was home to innumerable black women who dedicated their lives toward the betterment of life for others and changed the course of history. One such Black heroine is Madeline A. Williams. Her rise from humble beginnings in the South to becoming the first Black woman elected to the New Jersey Legislature is remarkable and inspiring.

This article concludes the discussion of wide-ranging influence of a remarkable unsung hero, Larry DeCosta. The exploration of the life of this prodigious champion for those who could not speak up for themselves appears in Part II of this trilogy published February 26, 2019.

Champion of Equity and Fairness

Larry DeCosta, as Executive Director of Camden Regional Services, believed in equity and fairness. As an attorney he frequently would argue “equitable” principles as well as “legal” principles” to obtain relief for his clients, whether they be minimum wage hotel housekeepers or indigents. This was demonstrated in the landmark NJ Supreme Court case, Community Realty Management v.

Unsung hero Larry DeCosta was the quintessential legal champion of the poor without seeking publicity for his remarkable achievements. His soft-spoken and humble manner belied his toughness; he was strong, silent, and self-contained. His deep humility and southern gentility would frequently catch his legal adversaries off guard when they came up against Mr. DeCosta in a hotly contested matter.

Without missing a beat or changing his tone, he would intellectually eviscerate the legal arguments of his unsuspecting adversary attorneys.

Larry D. DeCosta, a black attorney from the South, was born on October 24, 1950 in Hampton, South Carolina to Thomas and Sue DeCosta. His soft-spoken and humble ways continued to comprise his professional demeanor as an attorney both in and out of court. He spoke fondly of his time growing up in South Carolina and would say that persons living in the Northern States had much to learn from the gentility of Southerners. Larry D.

While strides have been made for LGBTQ persons (lesbians and gays particularly with the passage of the 2015 Marriage Equality Act) a double standard exists in some workplaces that results in a less than friendly workplace for LGBTQ workers. This double standard results in a work environment where sexual orientation for LGBTQ employees is still sexualized as documented in a study earlier this year released by the Human rights Campaign.

Sexualizing Gay Employees and the Double Standard

While non-LGBTQ persons may regularly make light conversation or comments regarding their dating situation, they may not accept LGBTQ workers doing the same because they fear hearing about an LGBTQ person’s sex life. The same is true for LGBTQ workers who are married or in other long-term committed same-sex relationships.

Sexualizing LGBTQ persons also occurs when a co-worker or supervisor think they have a license to make sexually inappropriate jokes or comments because they wrongly believe that these comments are sanctioned because of the out-of-closet employee’s gender identity or sexual orientation.