Minnesota State Bar Association

Annual Report Archives
MSBA Labor and Employment Law Section
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| 2005-06 | 2004-05 | 2003-04 | 2002-03 | 1996-97

The Governing Council of the Labor & Employment Law Section has had a very active and productive year. By far the most significant action is that the Governing Council voted to create a program to allow Labor & Employment practitioners to take a test to become "Certified Labor & Employment Specialists". The program is in the early phases and the Section must seek approval from the General Assembly before moving forward. However, the Council hopes to have the Certified Labor & Employment Specialist up and running by 2007.

The Council sponsored two CLE's: the Fall Labor & Employment CLE and the Annual Upper Midwest Employment Law Institute. Both were their usual successes. The Council also continues to attempt to reach out to section and non-section lawyers outside the metro area. The section will also sponsor a full-day CLE in the Fargo-Moorhead area in September 2006.

As indicated in the Chair's Report posted on the MSBA website, the council has also tinkered with the Labor & Employment's Quarterly Newsletter. Both the Chair's Report and the familiar legal update sent to all section members individually will now only be available online. Each section member will be notified via e-mail of the recent updates and will be provided a "hotlink" to the case summaries. In addition, case summaries will be made available whenever they are finished. Recent developments will now reach section members more quickly than waiting for the complete newsletter.

The Section continues to work to improve resources available on practicelaw.org. Council members have been working to provide more useful case law and statutory links on practicelaw.org. For example, when section members receive notice that a new case summary is available, a link will be provided so that section members can immediately access the case cited in the update.

The Mid-Winter Luncheon was held on March 1, 2006 and included a panel discussion on the Sarbanes/Oxley Act. The program was an unequivocal success and had the highest attendance of any luncheon in the past years.

Our annual Spring Dinner was well attended. The section awarded the Honorable Judge Lloyd Zimmerman the Leonard Lindquist Distinguished Attorney Award. Judge Zimmerman was given a plaque and charitable contribution of $1,000.00 which he chose to give to Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights.

The Spring Dinner also coincided with our annual meeting and election of 2006-2007 officers. Laurie Vasichek will be the Chair for 2006-2007, Craig Brandt will be the Vice Chair and Justin Cummins will be Secretary/Treasurer. Tom Traschel also became the newest council member.

Finally, the Spring Dinner included a talk by Yale Law Professor, Kenji Yoshino, who lectured on his book "Covering: The Hidden Assault On Our Civil Rights". It was a fascinating look at what he described as legally sanctioned demands to persons in protected classes to "cover" or to blend in with the mainstream.

Finally, the Governing Council has continued in its efforts to reach out to law students in the four local law schools to generate interest in practicing labor and employment law in Minnesota. We have continued our contacts with the law schools and invited law students to attend both the Mid-Winter Lunch and the Spring Dinner. Once again we also participated in a reception hosted by the newly formed Student Employment and Labor Law Association at the University of Minnesota School of Law.

The Labor & Employment Law Section enjoyed another excellent year. By far the most significant addition to our long list of activities and events was the creation of the Leonard Lindquist Distinguished Attorney Award. The Governing Council felt that we should create an award to honor outstanding attorneys in the labor and employment law practice area. The following is the criteria that the Governing Council determined would be appropriate:

A practicing or retired Employment and/or Labor Attorney
Minimum 5 years practice
Member of the MSBA L&E Section
Contributions and service to ABA, MSBA and/or County Bar Association
Contributions and service to the legal community
Contributions and service to the community at large
Pro Bono activities
Demonstrated a commitment to maintaining the highest standards of civility, morality, honesty and ethics in professional and personal activities.
Demonstrated a commitment to improving the practice of Labor and/or Employment law in Minnesota.

2. The Award would normally be given on an annual basis, unless it was determined that no qualified candidates had been nominated.

3. The selection process would include opening nominations to members of the MSBA Labor & Employment Section. The nominations would then go to a Screening Committee. The Screening Committee will be composed of representative(s) from the Governing Council and members of the MSBA Labor & Employment Section (to be selected by the Governing Council) and to be representative of the diversity of the Section. The Screening Committee would narrow the list of nominees to three or four. The Governing Council will make the selection from the nominees presented by the Screening Committee.

4. The award would be in the form of a suitable plaque and a charitable contribution in the amount of $1,000.00 to a charity selected by the recipient from a list of charities provided by the Governing Council

5. The award would be announced and presented at the annual Beef 'n Bull dinner.

Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis
Centro Legal
The Immigration Law Center (Oficina Legal)
The Minnesota Aids Project
The Battered Women's Justice Project
The Children's Law Center
The Children's Defense Fund
The University of Minnesota Law School Civil Practice Clinic
The Volunteer Lawyers Network
Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services
Minnesota Advocates
Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights Refugee and Asylum Project

Appropriately, the first Leonard Lindquist Award was presented posthumously to Leonard Lindquist's family at the recent Beef 'N Bull Dinner. It was a very touching and impressive event.

In addition to establishing the Leonard Lindquist award, the Section again co-sponsored two major CLE conferences. The Fall Labor and Employment Law Institute, which we sponsored with the National Labor Relations Board was held on November 17, 2004. The Spring Employment Law Institute, which we co-sponsored with Minnesota CLE was held on June 2nd and 3rd, with over 1,500 attendees.

The Section continues to publish the Section Newsletter, edited by Professor Deborah Schmedermann, from William Mitchell College of Law. This past year we published 2 issues, which are always a "must have" publication.

On February 23, 2005, we held our Annual Mid-Winter Lunch at Windows on Minnesota. This year we had a panel discussion regarding recent rulings interpreting the Minnesota Whistleblower Law. Hon. Joan Ericksen, Joe Hammel, and Susan Coler were our panel representatives and did an excellent job.

On June 1st, we held our Annual Beef 'N Bull Dinner also at Windows on Minnesota. In addition to the presentation of the First Leonard Lindquist Award, we were privileged to have Peggy Mastrioanni, Associate Counsel for the EEOC as our guest speaker. We also presented the academic achievement awards to students from the four law schools in the areas of labor law, employment discrimination law and employment law. We also elected our new Governing Council members and Officers for the next year.

On June 21, 2005, we co-hosted our Third Annual Labor Law Roundtable with Region 18 of the NLRB, at Windows on Minnesota. We had over 50 attendees in a lively and interesting discussion of current labor law issues.

The Governing Council also selected the Representative and Alternate Representative for the new MSBA General Assembly, which will convene in September 2005. For continuity purposes, we decided that the most recent past Chair of the Section should be the current Representative and the current Chair should be the Alternate Representative.

Finally, the Governing Council decided to reach out to law students in the four local law schools in an effort to generate interest in practicing labor and employment law in Minnesota. We established contacts with the law schools and invited law students to attend both the Mid-Winter Lunch and the Beef 'N Bull as our guests. In addition we participated in a reception hosted by the newly formed Student Employment and Labor Law Association at the University of Minnesota School of Law.

MSBA Labor & Employment Law Section
2003-04 Annual Report
Dan Wachtler, Chair

The Labor and Employment Law Section had a pretty good year. As in past years, we co-sponsored two major CLE conferences. The Fall Labor and Employment Law Insititute, which we sponsor with the NLRB, the EEOC, and Minnesota CLE, was held on November 20, 2003. There were 200 attendees. The Spring Employment Law Institute, which we sponsored with Minnesota CLE and the Twin City Human Resource Association, was hled on May 26 and 27, 2004. There wer over 1,600 attendees. In addition, this year, for the first time, the Section sponsored an out-state one-half day CLE program. It was held on March 18, 2004 in Moorhead, Minnesota and there were approximately 50 attendees. This was part of our outreach program and we hope to continue it in the future.

We also again published our Section Newsletter. The first edition of "Labor and Employment Law News" was published in the spring, and the second edition is due out this summer. Professor Deb Schmedermann at William Mitchell College of Law serves as our Editor and does a great job. We are looking at publishing the newsletter online, but not in place of the traditional hard copy.

The Section again sponsored its annual mid-winter lunch which was held on February 25, 2004. Over 100 people attended to hear Minnesota Department of Human Rights Commissioner Velma Korbel speak.

On May 25, 2004, we held our annual meeting/beef & bull spring dinner. There were approximately 70 attendees and the guest speaker, Honorable Mark W. Bennett, Federal District Court Judge from the Northern District of Iowa, gave a memorable and moving speech. Governing Council Members and Officers for next year were also elected.

On June 24, 2004, our Section sponsored the Second Annual Roundtable Meeting with Region 18 of the National Labor Relations Board. It was held at the Marquette Hotel in downtown Minneapolis. Approximately __ people attended. In addition, the Section is planning to sponor our First Roundtable Discussion with the local offices of the EEOC and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights. This will probably not occur until September, 2004.

The Section continues to evaluate its website and its tab in practicelaw.org, which are currently under revision.

Finally, in an effort to promote diversity, and as paert of a "fellowship" initiative, we invited minority students from the four law schools to be our guests at both the mid-winter lunch and the spring dinner.

Officers: Nancy Miller, Chair; Dan Wachtler, Vice Chair; Rick Ross, Secretary-Treasurer.

Governing Council Members: Harley Ogata, Martin Ho, Penny Philips, Teresa O'Toole, Janeen Rosas, T.J. Conley, Chuck Lentz, Laurie Vasichek, Steve Smith.

Practicelaw.org: While there was initial discussion about improving practicelaw.org, the MSBA decided to use its practicelaw resources for other sections. Some of the ideas that we discussed before realizing that we would not have the MSBA resources were: getting decisions of Hennepin County and Ramsey County on line; taking the MSBA employment law opinions that are published by email to members and organizing them within the practicelaw web site according to subject area.

Section Website. We continued to work on improvements to the Section web site, including improved accessibility for individuals with disabilities. It still is not clear how much activity the site gets.

Expert Witness Directory. We tried to generate participation in an expert witness directory to be published by the section for use by employment law practitioners looking for expert witnesses. Despite section-wide emails requesting members submit the names of experts they have used, very few people responded - not enough to make publishing a directory worthwhile.

Fellowship Program. During the 2000-01 term, then Section Chair Lloyd Zimmerman recommended that the section do something in the nature of a scholarship to promote diversity. At that time, we talked about partnering with the Minnesota Justice Foundation to administer the scholarship. This year the Section explored this idea further with Sharon Fishlowitz, the Executive Director of the MJF. The Section ultimately decided not to partner with MJF, because aside from providing the funding for a scholarship, the Section would be quite removed from the process. MJF would require us to fund a public interest position somewhere, but we would not have any input into the individual hired, and in fact, the MJF's policies do not allow them to consider race or ethnicity of applicants for positions. In the end, it would not further our goal of promoting diversity in the Section. We talked about coordinating a reception for law students of color at the four law schools, and in fact Rick Ross offered his firm's space for the event, but the event could not be coordinated in time for the end of the academic year for the students.

Greater Minnesota Project. Laurie Vasichek and Janeen Rosas raised the need for educational events in the St. Cloud area and the Moorhead area. Laurie Vasicheck has contacts at Moorehead State College and we discussed the idea of co-sponsoring a seminar with the College that would be open to students. We did not actually get an event on the calendar for the 2002-03 year.

Midwinter Lunch: The Section had a well-attended Midwinter Lunch this year at the Marquette Hotel on March 4, 2003, with Kirk Kolbo talking about his clients' affirmative action lawsuits against the University of Michigan that were pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Habitat for Humanity: On May 9, 2003, the Section had about 30 members volunteer to work in the rain and mud on the Lawyers for Habitat home. The Section also donated $1,000 to the home.

Fall and Spring Institutes. The Section co-sponsored the two annual Employment Law Institutes in November and May with Minnesota CLE.

Beef 'N Bull. The Labor & Employment Section's Annual Meeting/Beef 'n Bull Dinner was held on May 27, 2003 at Windows on Minnesota. U.S. Magistrate Judge Jayne Mayeron addressed the Section on her view from the bench as the newest Magistrate in the District of Minnesota.

NLRB. The Section co-sponsored an informal roundtable CLE event with Region 18 of the National Labor Relations Board on June 26, 2003 from 4:30 to 6:00. The event, which drew more than 50 participants, consisted of an open forum to share experiences, ideas and approaches in connection with lawyers' representation of parties in NLRB proceedings.

Dues: The Council voted to increase the dues for private sector members to $25, keep the public sector dues at $15 and have students join for free.

2003-04 Officers: Chair, Daniel Wachtler; Vice-Chair, Richard Ross; Secretary-Treasurer, Penny Phillips.

2003-04 Governing Council Members: Janeen Rosas, Martin Ho, Teresa O'Toole, Chuck Lentz and Laurie Vasichek all return next year.

Harley Ogata resigned, and the terms of TJ Conley, Nancy Miller and Steve Smith all ended.

The new Governing Council members are: Suzanne Spellacy with Taylor Corporation in Mankato, Jose Rosario with the Federal Mediation & Conciliation Services, Brendan Cummins with Miller O'Brien, and Craig Brandt with the Gray Plant law firm.

The 1996-97 year of the MSBA Labor and Employment Law Section was a busy one. We had a successful Employment and Labor Law Institute on November 21, 1996, and have conducted several "flash" surveys of members for input on programs and activities. We have increased access for 1997-98 for student and government attorney members of the section by discounting dues. We have completed a long-deferred update of the section's bylaws. We have improved the staffing of the newsletter with volunteers from the membership and have confirmed its mission and schedule, based on strong support from section members, and have published three newsletter editions. We had a successful program for the April 17, 1997 "Beef and Bull" dinner, which involved an insider's look at the Mitsubishi case by John Hendrickson, the EEOC's lead counsel on the case. We also cosponsored the May 29-30, 1997 Employment Law Institute, and offered a CLE for non- and "sometime" practitioners of labor and employment law at the MSBA annual convention on June 19, 1997. We are also completing a new section directory; the first-ever section brochure for new member recruitment, and have planned a first section "road show," a labor and employment law CLE in St. Cloud, for fall 1997. We have continued our agency liaison activities and have offered help to the federal courts' leadership in considering how to better address the growing volume of labor and employment law related cases. We have also been humbled by the members' registration response to the scheduled February 20, 1997 Party and Charitable Fundraiser, which was barely in the two figures, causing its cancellation! Clearly, this is an event for which there is no audience, and we will return to a more traditional lunchtime CLE presentation, or other "tried and true" programs, for winter 1997-98. We remain financially sound, with a balance of $6,445 in checking and money market accounts as of June 1, 1997, and have 764 members on the rolls.