New Jersey Employment Lawyer Blog

Keansburg's Board of Education voted last week to suspend the $741,000 severance package it planned to give its Superintendent of Schools, Barbara Trzeszkowski, until litigation filed by the State Attorney General to void the agreement is resolved. Keansburg, however, opted to remain a plaintiff in litigation it brought, along with the other "Abbott" districts in New Jersey, to contest the State's new school-funding formula. Keansburg and the other districts allege in that case that the new school-funding formula will deprive it of the $4.3 billion in special aid they receive from the State.

The Board's attorney, Richard Shapiro, recommended that Keansburg opt out of the school funding case, given the public relations nightmare surrounding Ms. Trzeszkowski's severance package. The Board did not follow that recommendation.

From a legal point of view, the severance package issue does not appear to be relevant to the constitutional challenge at the center of the school funding litigation. However, from a moral point of view, Keansburg's position is untenable. Keansburg's conduct, including negotiating and signing off on a $741,000 severance package for an administrator (while its students attend classes in trailers, mind you), and the conduct of other free-spending Abbott districts necessitated the school funding reform law. Keansburg can't credibly complain about the law's "unfairness" now.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

NJ’s Attorney General filed an injunction today to block the $741,000 retirement package for Keansburg Schools Superintendent Barbara A. Trzeszkowski, claiming that payout breaks the public trust and is illegal. “For a school board to so outrageously enrich a former superintendent through this type of ‘golden parachute’ at the expense of the children of Keansburg and the state’s taxpayers is not only contrary to public policy and unconscionable, it violates the fiduciary duty that the board owes the public,” says the state’s brief.

The State is specifically alleging that the severance package is unlawful and should be voided because:

• it violates public policy in that public funds are being used to pay for an “unreasonable and excessive (severance) provision” benefitting Ms. Trzeskowski and not the students;

• the school board members who approved Ms. Trzeszkowski’s severance package “breached their fiduciary obligation to the citizens of Keansburg and New Jersey to adequately protect the public funds” from excessive costs; and

• the contract lacks legal “consideration” in that the severance provision was calculated based on Ms. Trzeskowski’s 30-plus years of service in Keansburg, most of which was spent in jobs other than Superintendent.

I have to say that, despite my vocation as a plaintiff’s employment lawyer, I find this severance package to be excessive. I’m sure Ms. Trzeskowski is a very fine public servant, but the State is right on this one . . . the students should come first. Keansburg needs that money more than the Superintendent does. The severance package should be redrafted to provide a saner amount.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

Jevic Transportation laid off 1,200 workers in Delanco, NJ today, without adequate notice, without severance pay and apparently, in some cases, without their last paychecks. Jevic's conduct appears to violate NJ's "mini-WARN" statute, which became effective on December 20, 2007. Under this law, employers with over 100 employees are required to give 60 days' advance notice to employees who are terminated in a mass layoff or operation shutdown. The Company's failure to pay their workers their lawfully earned wages on the proper payday violates the New Jersey Wage and Hour Law.

Said State Sen. Diane Allen, who recently spoke at a gathering of the laid off workers, "[u]nder our law these employees should be given one week of severance for every year they have worked. And they should have been given 60 days notice so they had time to find a new job and get acclimated and get new health insurance. What happened is these people were just thrown out on the street."

My heart goes out to the families of the affected workers. I hope they land on their feet quickly and obtain the benefits they deserve under law.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

New Jersey's "mini-WARN" statute, which became effective on December 20, 2007, mandates that employers with over 100 employees give 60 days' advance notice to employees who are terminated in a mass layoff or operation shutdown. The New Jersey Commissioner of Labor and Workforce Development has recently issued a summary of the law and a Notification Form which employers can use when planning and executing a mass layoff of its employees. The link to the form is here: http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/forms_pdfs/lwdhome/Legal/LayoffNotificationForm2_31208REVDD6.pdf

Employees who have been advised of a plant shutdown or mass layoff should consult this document to make an initial determination of whether the event falls under the mini-WARN statute. The penalties for violating the statute include paying each affected employee one week of severance pay per year of service, in addition to any other severance payment they may receive. Certainly, if you believe your employer and the layoff are covered under the statute and your employer has not followed the advance notice requirement, you should immediately contact my firm or another decent plaintiff's employment attorney. You may be entitled to substantial benefits. If you are an employer who is planning to lay off workers, I suggest you consult an employment attorney well in advance of the layoff and take all steps necessary to comply with the law. Otherwise, you may be hearing from me.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Severance Negotiations , Wage and Hour Claims

Bookmark:

Most, if not all, employees experience unfair treatment at work at some time or another. Unfair treatment can include being passed over for a promotion or better opportunity because of nepotism, favoritism, or office politics. It can include a boss who is a bully and yells and screams at you for no reason. It can include being falsely accused of breaking office policy or work rules, or even committing a crime! By this point in my career, I've pretty much heard it all. Nothing surprises me when it comes to what goes on in New Jersey workplaces.

Unfortunately, as I have told countless employees over the years, there is no law against "unfair treatment" in the workplace. New Jersey, like every other state, is an "at will" employment state. "At will" employment means that your employer can take any action it wants towards you for any reason or no reason at all. You can be disciplined, demoted, transferred, "harassed" in the generic sense, or terminated at any time. On the plus side, you can quit your employment at any time, for any reason or no reason at all.

In certain cases, employers cross the line into unlawful conduct, which includes discrimination on the basis of age, gender, race, nationality, disability, sexual orientation, and the like. Unlawful conduct also includes retaliation against whistleblowers and employees who receive statutory benefits, such as FMLA leave. Actionable conduct can also include fraud, misrepresentation, breach of contract, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Before you contact an employment attorney for advice, consider whether the treatment you have suffered at work is due to unfairness or unlawful conduct. If the former, consider whether you can do anything to fix the situation "in house." I give some strategies for dealing with unfair treatment in a previous post. If the latter, do not hesitate to engage a competent, knowledgable employment attorney who can lay out your legal options and help you decide what steps to take. In either case, feel free to contact my firm for a free telephone consultation. We can quickly diagnose your situation and will let you know how we can help.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Discrimination and Harassment , Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

Another day, another round of layoffs for the region's workforce. This time its Woolrich, the oldest clothing company and woolen mill in the United States. The Company announced on Tuesday that it is laying off close to 50 garment workers in its Jersey Shore, PA plant due to a drop in demand for its products. It will be offering severance packages to the affected employees who cannot be placed elsewhere in the company.

Employers are not required to give severance pay to their employees. Then why do they do it? There are two main reasons, and neither of them is altruistic. One, they want to give employees a reason to stick around until the plant closes. If an employee quits before the layoff, he or she will generally not be eligible for severance pay. Two, the employers want the employees who are laid off to sign away their right to sue for any and all claims they may have. Once those packages are signed, the employer can breathe a big sigh of relief. It can't be sued by its former employees, for any reason.

Any employee who is offered a severance package should run, not walk, to an attorney who specializes in employment law. Your cousin's friend's brother who handled your house closing or your dog bite case won't do. If you do not work in New Jersey and would like to find a knowledgeable, competent employment attorney, contact my office for a referral or check out the National Employment Lawyers Association at http://www.nela.org. To all of the affected workers at the Woolrich plant, we send our sympathy and wishes for a better future.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Employment Contracts , Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

When you receive a severance package from your employer, don’t immediately assume that it’s non-negotiable. You may have more leverage than you know. A skilled and knowledgeable employment attorney can identify where you have leverage and use it to get you more severance pay.

The first and most important thing you need to know is that you already have some leverage to begin with. When your employer offers you a severance package, they are, in essence, asking you to sell away some of your most valuable rights. And believe me, your employer is very motivated to buy this “property” from you. Why are they so motivated? Because if your employer can get you to sign that piece of paper, they can forget about you. You can’t sue them, ever, for anything they did or did not do from the beginning of time to the moment you sign the package. Most of the time, you can’t even complain about them publicly. Some times, they restrict you from working down the street for a competitor. Your right to sue, your vow of silence, your right to compete – the rights you are “selling” have a value. Your employer sets the “buy” price when it puts that severance package in front of you. Before you “sell” your rights away in a severance package, consult an employment lawyer and find out whether the “buy” price your employer is offering is fair.

I’ve had to turn away many potential clients because they didn’t understand the concept of leverage and went ahead and signed their severance package without consulting an attorney. Never, ever, sign something you don’t fully understand. Do the research, find a decent employment attorney, and spend the money for a comprehensive severance package review. Even employees without much leverage in the legal sense can have leverage in other areas, which I will save for a later post.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Employment Contracts , Non-Compete Agreements , Severance Negotiations

Bookmark:

New Jersey's Law Against Discrimination prohibits employers from taking adverse actions against their employees on the basis of race, gender, age, religion, sexual preference, disability, or membership in other protected categories. The law does not prohibit an employer from taking negative actions against employees for other reasons, such as nepotism, favoritism, office politics, and the like. Yet employees who lose their jobs for these reasons, or who endure harassment or bullying which is not “discriminatory” in the legal sense, often suffer the same emotional and financial upset as do victims of unlawful discrimination. What are some strategies for dealing with unfair treatment in the workplace?

I would advise anyone experiencing negative treatment in the workplace to immediately begin to diary or journal the events as they occur. If the situation worsens and becomes legally actionable down the road, the written record can be important evidence in your case. In addition, the act of writing down your problems can have a cathartic and healing effect.

Next, you should report the unfair treatment to your Company’s human resources department, preferably in writing. Yes, I know, they won’t do anything about it. But, again, the main reason for making the report is to create a paper trail which may come in handy down the road. There is also the slight chance that they actually listen to you and try to help you.

If you have documented and reported the unfair treatment and it still persists, you should seriously consider changing jobs. Situations like these tend get worse over time, not better. I’m speaking from personal experience, as well as what I’ve learned from counseling employees for the last ten years. You will wind up quitting or getting fired some time down the road anyway, and in the meantime you will be extremely stressed out, lose sleep, get depressed, angry, or anxious, all of which can lead to more serious health problems. No job is worth losing your health. The decision to leave a job on your own terms, on your own timetable, is an empowering one. Just make sure your job search does not interfere with your current job duties or violate any non-compete agreements you may have signed. It goes without saying that you should never quit a job until you have secured a new one.

If you are an employee caught in the gray area between unfair treatment and illegal discrimination or retaliation, consider speaking to a competent employment attorney who can lay out your options and help you make an informed decision about your next career move.

Posted by Steven Siegler | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Discrimination and Harassment , Non-Compete Agreements , Severance Negotiations , Whistleblower Retaliation

Bookmark: