Articles/News

Aug 8 2019

Considerations for Businesses With Seasonal Hiring

Sexual Harassment Training This year California expanded sexual harassment training requirements to include all employers with 5 or more employees and to require training for both supervisory and non-supervisory employees. If seasonal hiring is typical for your business or industry, seasonal employees count toward the employee threshold. Seasonal employees must receive sexual harassment training within […]

Jul 16 2019

Tips to Hiring and Managing Employees

Classifying Workers (Independent Contractor v. Employee) Before looking for the right candidate, it’s important to first ask, “Is the worker an independent contractor or an employee?” Due to the California Supreme Court’s ruling in Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court, (2018) 4 Cal.5th 903, it’s become much more difficult to classify an employee as […]

Jul 16 2019

California Consumer Privacy Act

Compliance with the CCPA will require many companies to reevaluate certain practices relating to the collection and use of Personal Information. This short note provides information related to who needs to comply with the CCPA and what is required to begin the assessment of the impact of CCPA on your organization. Important Dates January 1, […]

Jun 27 2019

Donahue Fitzgerald Attorneys Named 2019 Super Lawyers

Kristin A. Pace: Estate and Probate Mary M. Rudser: Estate and Probate Elizabeth M. Engh: Estate and Probate Jonathan McNeil Wong: Immigration Practice areas represented include estate and probate and immigration. All recognized attorneys have been honored for seven years or more. The Northern California Super Lawyers, part of Thomson Reuters, is a rating service […]

Jun 25 2019

Berkeley, Emeryville, SF, and San Leandro Employers: Don’t Forget Mid-Year Minimum Wage Increases

Of the four, Emeryville’s is the highest, at $16.30/hr, and the same rate will apply to all businesses, big and small. San Leandro’s minimum hourly pay jumps to $14.00 on July 1, as Berkeley and San Francisco’s new minimum rate of $15.59/hr takes effect. Note that in prior years, Berkeley’s minimum wage increases occurred in […]

Jun 17 2019

Of Counsel Barbara L. Friedman Joins Donahue Fitzgerald

With over 20 years of experience in dispute resolution and intellectual property counseling, Barbara’s experience covers from domestic and international trademark selection, clearance, registration, and enforcement, to negotiating and drafting assignments, licenses, and related agreements. Barbara received her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and her law degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo […]

May 23 2019

GDPR-Year One: Practitioners’ Perspective

According to the International Association of Privacy Professionals, over the last year in the EU, more than 94,000 individual complaints have been filed, 200,000 cases have been received by Data Protection Authorities, and GDPR enforcement actions have resulted in over €56,000,000 in fines.1 There is little question that data privacy and security has become a […]

Apr 19 2019

Donahue Fitzgerald Advises The Speech Pathology Group in its Partnership with Ridgemont Equity Partners

Read the full press release, Ridgemont Equity Partners Announces Partnership with The Speech Pathology Group.

Mar 1 2019

Reporting Time Pay Obligations Expanded for California Businesses

Often times, businesses send employees home early if business is slow.   In those situations, where “an employee is required to report for work and does report, but is not put to work or is furnished less than half said employee’s usual or scheduled day’s work, the employee shall be paid for half the usual or […]

Feb 1 2019

An Estate Planner’s Guide to Family Law Presumptions

I. Introduction As estate planners, we prepare carefully crafted estate plans for clients who typically have a clear view of their family dynamics and ultimate wishes. We aim to be thorough and to provide multiple contingency plans so our clients’ wishes are carried out upon their deaths. However, it cannot be ignored that, with the […]