We’ve listed some of the more notable changes that occurred in 2019 below. Please make sure that you’re up to date with your own area’s changing legislation in order to stay compliant.

‘Ban the Box’ and ‘Clean State’ Laws

2019 saw the continuation of ‘Ban the Box‘ laws being spread, in the last decade nearly three dozen states and more than 150 communities have passed legislation that help ensure ex-offenders aren’t left out of the hiring pool.

Other clean state laws included:
-New Mexico’s Criminal Offender Employment Act
–Colorado Chance to Compete Act
–Fair Chance to Work Law – Westchester County, New York
-Clean State Laws – Colorado, Nevada, West Virginia

Pay Equity Laws

Pay equity laws took affect in Oregon, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Washington, Alabama, Illinois, Missouri, New York, Kansas City, and Suffolk County in 2019. Even more pay equity laws are expected to be passed in 2020 and 2021.

These laws are being passed in an effort to close the wage gap between men and women. Most of these pay equity laws include statutes that prevent employers from asking about an employee’s previous pay history. As these laws continue to spread, please stay aware for your own hiring protocols.

Some lawmakers are adding additional concepts to these pay equity laws such as safe harbor. Colorado’s pay equity law which passed in 2019, but will take effect in 2021 encourages employers to complete internal pay equity analyses to find wage differences based on gender and remedy them.

New Marijuana Accommodations

Marijuana laws have largely changed on the state or local level within the past couple of years. Thirty-three states and the District of Columbia have now passed some form of medical marijuana law, with 11 states legalizing marijuana for recreational use.

This has been one of the largest subjects of interest for employers as they grapple with how to handle this new legislation within their own workforce.

If you have questions on marijuana legislation and how it may play a role in your own hiring and drug testing policies, we highly recommend consulting legal council about your specific state and area laws.

Some more notable legislation that took place during 2019 with marijuana included some of the following:

-New Jersey’s Jake Honig Compassionate Use Medical Cannabis Act
-New Mexico’s SB 406
-Oklahoma’s Medical Marijuana and Patient Protection Act
-Nevada’s AB 132
-New York City’s Int. No. 1445-A
–Whitmire v. Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

Looking Forward

As we continue to move forward into 2020, we expect to see many of these same legal trends continuing to spread. Especially as new technologies and continued efforts to build a more equal workforce continue.

The post A Look Back: 2019’s Big Legal Decisions and Changes In Screening appeared first on Blueline.

Along with CBD oil’s newfound popularity, however, a new onslaught of legal and best practice questions have emerged for employers.

Will CBD products impair my employees or endanger my workplace? If an employee or applicant tests positive on a drug test and blames it on CBD, what should we do? Should we allow CBD products in a zero-tolerance workplace?

Understanding CBD and THC

Before diving into these questions, it’s important to understand the different kinds of CBD products there are on the market and how THC may play a role in them.

THC is the main psychoactive ingredient in cannabis and what causes most of the mind-altering or “high” effects of the plant. It is also usually present to a small degree in most CBD products. The amount of THC in CBD products can vary based on the manufacturer, product, and what variety of cannabis the CBD was derived from.

CBD can be extracted from both hemp and marijuana. Hemp and marijuana are both varieties of the cannabis plant. However, hemp is a variety that contains considerably less THC concentration than the marijuana strain—usually less than 0.3 percent.

Recent federal legislation has removed hemp and hemp-derived products (including CBD) from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. This means that hemp and hemp-derived products are no longer considered to have “no.. accepted medical use and high potential for abuse” by the federal government. A 2015 NIH paper also said that although much about the CBD is still unknown, they believed that CBD use wouldn’t impair employees.

That being said, some CBD products are derived from marijuana (instead of hemp) and have higher levels of THC. Additionally, a study was performed in 2017 and found that nearly seven in ten CBD products do not contain the amount of THC advertised—meaning that users can be getting more than they bargained for. CBD products are not regulated, so as a user it can be hard to find assurance that your product is exactly what you believe it to be.

Current State Legislation on CBD

Fourteen states currently have a legalized CBD oil program with most of those programs requiring that the CBD be extracted from hemp and contain less than 1% THC.

Below is a chart that outlines the current states with CBD oil programs. This chart was shared in OraSure Technologies’ newsletter What’s the Buzz – you can find more in that article here.

Employment And CBD

So what can you do as an employer?

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) recently discussed some of the complications that cannabis oil presents for drug testing.

“If an employee is taking CBD or cannabis oil… in accordance with a state’s medical marijuana laws, there may be some state law protections for the employee. Otherwise, employers with zero-tolerance drug policies are free to discipline employees for failing drug testing, even if the ingestion of THC was inadvertent.”

You probably won’t be able to tell whether a positive test for THC was caused by the use of CBD or cannabis oil rather than marijuana use. However, you can look for other signs of impairment such as red eyes and delayed reaction times and make sure that your supervisors are trained to recognize and handle drug impairment symptoms. If someone does test positive for THC, it may be best practice to have a conversation with that person first to see if they have a reason for the positive test.

Ultimately, most of the decisions are up to you as the employer. Whether or not you decide to take adverse employment action should depend on the applicable state laws and the nature of the individual’s job. Disciplinary action for a positive THC test, even if it were due to the use of cannabis oil, are likely to be justified if it is a federal or safety-sensitive position.

The post CBD Oil: What Employers Should Know appeared first on Blueline.

Colorado is no stranger to the ‘ban-the-box’ notion as similar bills were brought up in 2016 and 2017, but both times they weren’t passed through. The current version of the bill is posted online here. We’ve outlined some changes that are proposed in this current version of the bill below.

Employers would be prohibited from:

-Inquiring about an applicant’s criminal history on an initial application
-Placing a statement in an employment application that a person with a criminal history may not apply for a position or advertising anything similar

Employers would still be allowed to obtain a job applicant’s criminal history outside of the above stipulations. Certain exemptions are included however for employers regarding the advertising and initial employment restrictions if:

-The law prohibits a person who has a particular criminal history from being employed in a particular job
-The employer is participating in a program to encourage employment of people with criminal histories
-The employer is required by law to conduct a criminal history record check for a particular position

To stay updated on the status of this bill you can go to https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb19-1025. As of 2/5/2019 the bill has been introduced and is currently under consideration.

The post ‘Ban The Box’ Bill Makes A Comeback In Colorado After Being Struck Down Twice appeared first on Blueline.

Under the law, adults of age 21 and older can now possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana. They are allowed two mature plants and four immature plants. Act 86 doesn’t mention Vermont’s current medical marijuana program so the new legislation should not effect any medical marijuana users.

There are heavy punishments set in place for those that abuse this new law. Individuals found possessing more than one ounce of marijuana could face imprisonment charges and fines, with the punishment for having more than two ounces potentially amounting up to three years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

Questions still linger on how authorities will enforce these rules, but they say clarity will come with case law.

There are currently no systems in place to tax or regulate the production of marijuana in Vermont as well as no provisions set up for pot shops. This means that to obtain marijuana users must either grow it themselves, buy it from illicit dealers, or from outside state lines. However, it is expected that the legislature will soon develop a tax-and-regulate system with many hopeful for a legalized commercial market to be established at next year’s legislative session.

Act 86 does include some regulations for the newly legalized marijuana, some things that will still get you in trouble include:

• Smoking in a car: Both drivers and passengers are forbidden from smoking and can face steep fines if caught.
• Smoking on Lake Champlain: The lake is considered federal waters, which means it is under federal rule where marijuana is still illegal.
• Selling marijuana: A legal commercial market hasn’t been established yet for Vermont.
• Smoking in a public area: beach, park, sidewalk, restaurant, etc.: Vermont law specifically states that recreational marijuana is limited to “individual dwellings”.

Things continue to shift across the globe regarding marijuana. Canada legalized recreational marijuana just two weeks before Vermont. Several bills have been put forward in Congress as well just this year with proposed changes to regulations regarding the drug.

“Just a few short years ago, it would have be inconceivable to imagine a leader of one of two major parties to introduce a bill to de-schedule and decriminalize marijuana at the federal level,” Michael Lisezwski, the government affairs director for Americans for Safe Access, said in a press release, “And yet, here we are in the very next session of Congress with several bills that would end federal marijuana prohibition introduced into the Senate by prominent members of both parties.”

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