Disability Discrimination

The New Jersey Superior Court ruled in favor of an employee who complained to the employer about unsafe Covid-19 practices in the workplace in a whistleblower case.

Unlawful Retaliation for Objecting to Employer’s Failure to Follow Covid-19 Health Safeguards

As was recently decided in the case of Mark Loeb v. Vantage Custom Classics, Inc., if your employer retaliated against you for your complaining about or objecting to what you reasonably believed was the employer’s failure to follow proper health safeguards in the workplace as to Covid-19, you may have a whistleblower claim under the New Jersey Conscientious Employee Protection Act (CEPA.)

If You Notified Employer That You Were Exposed to/or Had Contracted Covid-19

If you reported to your employer that you were exposed to Covid-19 and you wanted to follow proper government and/or medical guidelines as to quarantine, etc.

Many employees at some point become unhappy with their work situation and feel “fed up” with their work environment. Sometimes they believe that their boss is pressuring them to resign.  They may need time to secure another position with a different employer but are concerned about the lack of income during the period after they quit and before they secure new employment.

If you are unhappy in your job and thinking about resigning, you should contact an experienced employment law attorney before you do so. If you think your employer is forcing you out, pressuring you to quit, discriminating against you, harassing you, or illegally retaliating against you, you can contact this law office now for a free consultation.

NJ employees who are disabled sometimes hit stone walls when they ask their employer for a disability accommodation that will allow them to keep working.   Some employers either deliberately or unknowingly do not understand the law and the standards to be applied.

First, in New Jersey, all employers, public and private, under the NJ Law Against Discrimination (LAD) are required by law to provide reasonable accommodations for an employee’s disability to allow them to keep working. This is true whether the disability is temporary or permanent. These cases frequently turn on what is considerable to be “reasonable” accommodation standards for an employee’s disability accommodation.

Employees in New Jersey and elsewhere may feel nervous about retiring in their 60's, even when they had previously planned retiring by age 65 or 66 when they were younger workers. Increased costs of living and shrinking pension benefits may be part of the cause of the nervousness for their wanting to extend their retirement age, but anxiety regarding the decision as to the best age to retire can be exacerbated if they perceive they are being pushed out of the workforce by their employer, that their self-determination of when they will choose retire is being taken away from them.

First, employees in NJ should know that in NJ, it is illegal for an employer to fire someone because of their age - even if they are “senior” citizen workers in their 70's and 80's etc. (I personally don’t care for that phrase- “senior citizens” - it’s unfortunately loaded with far too many negative connotations. Hoping that mainstream culture substitutes “venerable” or that something similar will eventually replace it.

While Boards of Education have the right to choose which non-tenured teachers will have their contracts renewed and which they refuse to renew, the refusal cannot be based on illegal reasons. Motherhood is foremost for the continuation of the species! Pregnant women should be protected and supported, not discriminated against! As explained in 

Pregnant teachers in NJ are subject to the same anti-discrimination laws as are employees in other professions and this is true even when the pregnant teacher is non-tenured. Motherhood is foremost for the continuation of the species! Pregnant women should be protected and supported, not discriminated against!  I have successfully represented pregnant, non-tenured teachers whose contacts were not renewed and succeeded in recovering money for them.

Boards of Education have the right to decide which non-tenured employees’ contracts will be renewed and which will not be renewed. However, a decision to not renew cannot be based on an illegal reason. Pregnancy is a defined protected class pursuant to the New Jersey Pregnant Worker's Fairness Act (PWFA).

A worker who is pregnant and experiences a negative change in her employer’s attitude after disclosing her pregnancy to the employer, is experiencing three types of discrimination- sex, disability and pregnancy discrimination - rolled into one bias. If you are pregnant, protections for you exist under numerous federal and state laws. If your employer failed to renew your annual contract or terminated you after you disclosed to your employer that you are pregnant, or if upon returning from a pregnancy leave, your employer did not hold your job for you, you may be eligible for back pay, front pay and damages.

Until the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (NJLAD) was amended to specifically include “pregnancy” as its own protected class, lawyers bringing claims under the NJLAD had to allege sex and/or disability discrimination, because pregnancy at that time was not its own distinct class requiring protections.

Male workers who requested time off or a reasonable accommodation for a disability due to a medical condition related to their reproductive systems,  were frequently allowed a reasonable accommodation or time off for medical leave to properly deal with their disability, while  pregnant women who requested an accommodation that will allow them to maintain a healthy pregnancy, or who needed a reasonable accommodation while recovering from childbirth, were either terminated, or not had their annual contract renewed or otherwise removed from their positions based on bogus reasons given by the employer.