Effective Jan. 1, 2020, Illinois’ Workplace Transparency Act requires employers to make changes to anti-harassment policies, incorporate an annual training program, make changes to employment and severance agreements, and report annually to the Illinois Department of Human Rights.

Join us online from noon until 2 p.m. on Wednesday, May 6 for this introductory look at the rights of employees and the new obligations of employers; how to identify harassing behaviors as defined by federal, state, and local laws; the venues, remedies, and damages available to current and former employees; and how to advise your clients on employee handbook revisions.

Voting is now underway in the 2020 ISBA Election. ISBA's election provider Election America distributed ballots on March 26. All members of the Association (except non-lawyer members) with dues paid by March 1, 2020 are eligible to vote. 

The deadline for voting is Thursday, April 30, 2020 at 4:30 p.m. Central Time for all voting methods: e-ballot, paper or internet.

The Illinois Supreme Court, for the first time in its history, will hold oral arguments via the Zoom videoconference platform when it hears cases in May. The court is doing this to practice social distancing while still conducting court proceedings during the COVID-19 pandemic.

ISBA members from across the state provide helpful advice for other attorneys during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Illinois Supreme Court has announced that attorneys with a June 30, 2020 MCLE compliance deadline may opt for a three-month extension at no cost if they choose the option by July 31, 2020. Hundreds of free accredited courses are available, including the ISBA’s member-only 15 hours of free CLE per bar year (which ends June 30), sponsored by the ISBA Mutual Insurance Company.

The full press release is as follows:

The Illinois Supreme Court recognizes that, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, attorneys with last names beginning A-M in the 2018-2020 reporting period may be unable to complete their continuing education credits by the upcoming June 30, 2020 deadline. In consultation with the MCLE Board, the Court has decided to provide every attorney in this group the option to secure a no-cost, three-month extension to complete those credits. An attorney secures that extension by submitting an online report to the Board no later than July 31, 2020. 

Consider the following sequence of events: The trial court enters summary judgment in favor of the defendant and strikes the affidavit of plaintiff’s expert witness. Within 30 days, the plaintiff files a motion for reconsideration of the foregoing order. The motion is stricken because the plaintiff failed to provide the judge with a courtesy copy of the motion. The plaintiff then renotices the motion (and, presumably, provides a courtesy copy this time). The motion is heard and denied on the merits six weeks later. Within 30 days of the denial, the plaintiff files notice of appeal. If, based on the foregoing, you thought the plaintiff perfected a timely appeal, think again, writes Reuben A. Bernick in his April Illinois Bar Journal article, “Perils of the Postjudgment Motion,” which offers a practical examination of postjudgment motion practice.

Join us online from noon until 1 p.m. on Tuesday, May 5 to learn how to advise clients in the COVID-19 era.

By now, many clients have filed for their portion of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) or applied for an Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL), both of which are made available through the CARES Act. For those that have not, there may exist lingering questions on the impact of these loan opportunities. For the businesses that have obtained or will obtain PPP loans, there exists certain requirements to ensure the maximum amount can be forgiven. Additionally, the CARES Act provides businesses (and their employees) a number of additional opportunities to weather the COVID crisis. At the same time, there are certain measures a business should employ to protect its interests while employees work from home. Likewise, our clients need to be aware of the paid leave obligations under the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) and related statutes.

The Illinois State Bar Association’s Lawyer Finder Service provides referrals to local lawyers Mondays through Fridays. The Service makes referrals in a number of areas of law. For the month of March 2020 there were more than 600 referrals given.

Here are the results for March 2020:

The Illinois Supreme Court handed down four opinions on Thursday, April 16. In People v. Lindsey, the court held that the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights were not violated when the police obtained a search warrant partially based on a drug dog alerting outside his hotel room. In Dynak v. Board of Education of Wood Dale School District 7, the court held that section 24-6 of the School Code only permits teachers to use up to 30 days of accumulated paid sick leave during the six-week period immediately following the birth of a child, and not at the start of the next school year. In Dew-Becker v. Wu, the court ruled that the plaintiff could not recover the $100 he lost in a two-person, head-to-head competition conducted on FanDuel involving an NBA contest under the Loss Recovery Act. In Restore Construction Company, Inc. v. The Board of Education of Proviso Township High Schools District 209, the court addressed whether the Board of Education of Proviso Township High Schools District 209 could assert the Code’s requirements for contract approval to defeat a quantum meruit claim for costs to restore a high school after a fire.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s office has issued an executive order temporarily suspending the service of garnishment summonses, wage deduction summonses, and citations to discover assets on consumer debtors and consumer garnishees for the duration of the Gubernatorial Disaster Proclamations.