New York announces new sexual harassment laws.
Credit unions and other employers in New York will soon be subject to new sexual harassment laws that Governor Andrew Cuomo has called the strongest and most comprehensive in the nation.
The rules require employers to adopt and distribute sexual harassment policies, as well as provide annual sexual harassment prevention training, among other things. They also ban nondisclosure agreements and arbitration for sexual harassment claims.
New York State's laws take effect October 9; a second set for New York City takes effect April 1, 2019. However, effective immediately, employers in the state can be held liable for sexual harassment of non-employees such as contractors, consultants or contracted workers. Starting in July, employers will no long be able to require nondisclosure agreements for sexual harassment claims or require that sexual harassment claims go to arbitration.
Thomas B. Wassel, a partner at law firm Cullen and Dykman in Garden City, New York, said some of the changes are far-reaching compared to other states, though several of those other states are headed in the same general direction.
"I think over time you're going to see more and more states adopting similar laws in the wake of the #Metoo movement, and greater awareness and sensitivity toward sexual harassment matters," he said.
"Conduct that might once have been considered 'risque' or 'just a little out of bounds' is now being challenged legally, and companies — including credit unions — that don't take heed of this movement not only risk legal liability, but they risk losing business because of bad publicity and could lose customers and clients," Wassel added.
The new laws can also affect credit unions that aren't based in New York.
"If you have a credit union that, let's say is headquartered in Pennsylvania but has a branch in New York state, then the employees who work in that branch would be covered by this law," Wassel explained.
Some parts of the requirements are less certain, he noted.
"For example, the provision in New York state law that states that you can't require employees to arbitrate sexual harassment complaints. Well, the Federal Arbitration Act more or less says that you can. And does that supersede, not just for federally charted banks, but for any business in New York, does it supersede New York state law? That's frankly an open question that some professionals in the area have raised as an unanswered question," he explained. "There are a slew of issues that are going to have to be either litigated, or regulations we'll have to spell out between now and the effective date."
Nonetheless, most companies doing business in New York likely already comply with most of the new requirements, Wassel said.
"But that's a very broad statement. Any by that I mean this: any company and any credit union that does not have a sexual harassment policy in place, well, they're crazy," he added.
"Every employer should have had a policy that defines sexual harassment [that] gives examples of do's and don'ts — mostly don'ts — of sexual harassment [and] has a procedure by which employees can make internal complaints and have those complaints remedies," he added. "Again, any sensible business is already going to have that in place."
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