Fair Employment Practices (H 5262, H 5266)

Critical proposed changes to the state’s Fair Employment Practices Act were introduced in two separate pieces of legislation this year and would make individual employee-supervisors, and not just the company employing them, subject to personal liability for their own acts of discrimination.

Critical proposed changes to the state’s Fair Employment Practices Act were introduced in two separate pieces of legislation and would have made individual employee-supervisors, and not just the company employing them, subject to personal liability for their own acts of discrimination. Along with including these important provisions which can deter sexual and other harassment, H 5262 would have further expanded the definition of “employee” to cover a wider breadth of working personnel, including a protection for “domestic workers” who had previously been exempted within the statute. We strongly supported both pieces of legislation, but they both died in committee.