Employment Counseling and Litigation

RSHS’ Labor & Employment Group is dedicated to guiding employers through California’s maze of labor and employment laws. Our mission is to provide strategic advice and training to employers so that workplace issues are resolved quickly and efficiently. To accomplish this we tailor our approach to the unique needs of each client.

Our success in assisting employers is widely recognized throughout California. Our attorneys have represented clients in dozens of published decisions involving cutting-edge legal issues. Our attorneys also regularly publish articles on labor and employment law topics and are frequent speakers at conferences around the state.

Employment Counseling

The most valuable legal advice is that which prevents problems before they arise. The firm's practice model relies heavily on avoiding litigation through anticipatory advice and training, saving our clients the cost and disruption of lawsuits by employees.

Employers need a quick response from attorneys who know how to solve problems, not just recite the law. Our employment attorneys have extensive experience in virtually all aspects of public workplace law and the practical ability to apply the law and solve problems in a timely manner. Most of our attorneys have worked in the public sector and fully understand the practical and political realities that our clients face.

We are skilled at navigating the complicated web of employment laws, collectively bargained contracts, civil service rules, charter provisions, local codes and ordinances, and personnel rules that intersect in public employment. The types of matters on which we regularly advise employers include:

Responding to claims of harassment, discrimination or retaliation
Responding to request for reasonable accommodation under ADA
Managing absent employees without violating the FMLA, CFRA, ADA, FEHA or the myriad of other leave laws
Discipline and discharge of employees, including assessing risk, advising on due process procedures, and reviewing or preparing documentation
Internal police investigations and discipline, including compliance with the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act
Implementing and enforcing drug and alcohol policies
Developing lawful hiring and background screening processes
Designing workplace violence prevention programs and managing incidents of violence or threatened violence, including obtaining restraining orders or injunctions
Drafting employment policies and employment manuals
Compliance with FLSA overtime standards, including exempt classification issues
Advising on layoffs and furloughs

California and federal laws often intersect, so how the employer handles one legal issue can often affect a related case that is going on in another forum. They most significant contemporary example is the intersection of ADA law and workers compensation law. Underlying many workers compensation cases is a claim of disability that needs to be addressed through a reasonable accommodation process. Failure to miss that issue can result in significant liability. Conversely, often workers compensation proceedings are a tool for addressing issues of disability. RSHS has partnered with the preeminent California workers compensation law firm, Laughlin Falbo Levy & Moresi, to help assure clients of each firm that they are seeing and getting advice on the “whole picture,”

Employment Litigation

When an employment dispute proceeds to litigation, RSHS provides an aggressive, vigorous response. When litigation is filed, we immediately assess the facts and law and identify the strengths and weaknesses of any case. We then work closely with the client in order to develop the litigation strategy that best suits the client’s needs. Once a litigation strategy is decided, we implement the strategy in the most cost effective way possible.

We have litigated extensively before state and federal courts, arbitrators, and administrative tribunals in virtually all aspects of public workplace law. Our attorneys have an impressive record of success at knocking out lawsuits on summary judgment. Where it is necessary to go the distance, we have skilled trial lawyers who are at home in the courtroom and in front of juries. Collectively, we have defended race, gender, sexual orientation, age, national origin, religion, and disability discrimination claims, harassment and retaliation claims, failures to accommodate, wrongful discharge suits, speech and whistleblower cases, defamation lawsuits, negligent hiring and retention claims, FLSA overtime suits, civil service terminations, and tenure denials.

For more information on our firm’s Employment Law advice and representation, please contact Jon Holtzman (415-678-3807, Tim Yeung (916273-1707, or Nikki Hall (415 678-3813 Nikki Hall