Insights

February

• 2/17/2015
  Governor Kasich Proposes Significant Severance Tax Increase
  On February 11, 2015, Representative Ryan Smith introduced Ohio House Bill 64 (the Bill), the governor’s proposed 2016-2017 biennial budget bill. As Governor John Kasich previously announced, the Bill contains a number of Ohio tax proposals, including reform of Ohio’s severance taxes.
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• 2/13/2015
  State and Local Tax Alert: House Bill 64: Sales Tax Increases Will Affect You
  The language of Governor Kasich’s 2016-2017 biennial budget bill was recently released. House Bill 64 has 84,757 lines and 2,783 pages of text. Many of the details track very closely to summaries of the bill announced during the preceding weeks. The proposal includes significantly reduced personal income tax rates, continued and expanded small business income tax exclusions and higher personal exemptions.
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• 2/12/2015
  Securities Alert: SEC Proposes Disclosure Rules on Hedging Policies
  On February 9, 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission (the SEC) proposed rules to implement Section 955 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which directs the SEC to require, by rule, each public company to disclose in any proxy or consent solicitation material for an annual meeting of the shareholders of the company whether any employee or director, or any designee of such employee or director, is permitted to hedge the company’s equity securities.
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• 2/12/2015
  Whistleblower Defense Alert: The Withering of The Public Disclosure Bar
  Courts continue to whittle away at the public disclosure bar, historically one of the best ways to dispose of parasitic qui tam lawsuits. Most recently, the Eleventh Circuit issued a ruling regarding the impact of the 2010 amendments to the False Claims Act’s (FCA) public disclosure rule. In its opinion in U.S. ex rel. Osheroff v. Humana, Inc., the Eleventh Circuitjoined the Fourth Circuit in holding that the public disclosure rule, as amended in 2010, is no longer a jurisdictional bar to an FCA action. Instead, under the amended version of the statute, defendants now must move to dismiss allegations that have been publicly disclosed under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6).
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• 2/12/2015
  Strategies for Legally Generating and Monitoring Online Reviews
  Whitney Gibson, the leader of the firm’s internet defamation practice, authored an article for Social Media Explorer titled “Strategies for Legally Generating and Monitoring Online Reviews.”
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• 2/10/2015
  Labor and Employment Alert: When It Comes to Off-the-Clock Work, Employer Knowledge is Key
  FLSA claims involving off-the-clock work have become a popular claim in recent years. A recent Eleventh Circuit ruling has made employer defenses to such lawsuits a bit more challenging. In Bailey v. TitleMax of Ga., Inc. (11th Cir., No. 14-11747, 1/15/15), the employer argued that the plaintiff’s claims should be barred because the plaintiff failed to report all hours worked, which caused the company to under-compensate the plaintiff.
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• 2/10/2015
  Health Care Alert: Ninth Circuit Affirms Order Requiring Divestiture of a Hospital–Physician Group Merger
  In a much anticipated opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld an Idaho district court’s order mandating the unwind of a merger between two health care providers in Nampa, Idaho after determining that the merger violated § 7 of the Clayton Act. In the wake of the FTC’s recent and heightened enforcement in the health care industry, St. Alphonsus Medical Center-Nampa, Inc. v. St. Luke’s Health System, Ltd., No. 14-35173, (9th Cir. Feb. 10, 2015), offers important insight into the hotly debated interplay between the integration encouraged under the Affordable Care Act and the operation of federal antitrust laws.
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• 2/5/2015
  Whistleblower Defense Alert: Sixth Circuit Affirms Importance of Government Witnesses in Materiality Analysis
  A recent Sixth Circuit opinion provides defendants a valuable roadmap for using government witness testimony to defeat False Claims Act (FCA) claims on materiality grounds at the summary judgment stage. In U.S. ex rel. American Systems Consulting, Inc. v. ManTech Advanced Systems Int’l Inc., Case No. 14-3269 (6th Cir.), the court rejected the relator’s argument that materiality decisions should be left to a jury. Instead, the court expressly held that “a judge may decide as a matter of law whether a misrepresentation was material under the FCA.”
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• 2/4/2015
  State and Local Tax Alert: Ohio Governor Kasich Proposes Numerous Tax Changes in 2016-2017 State Budget
  Ohio Governor John Kasich recently outlined the tax changes he will include in his 2016-2017 biennial state budget. The governor’s proposal is a mixture of cuts, increases and elimination of taxes which he says will result in a net $500 million tax cut for Ohioans. The taxes included in his package are: sales tax, commercial activity tax, oil and gas severance tax, individual income tax and tobacco tax.
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• 2/4/2015
  Labor and Employment Alert: A New Ohio General Assembly = Potential Challenges Ahead for Ohio Employers
  Groucho Marx once said that “politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedies.” So as we welcome the 131st Ohio General Assembly, we already have the introduction of pro-employee wage-and-hour legislation. On February 2, 2015, Senator Kenny Yuko (D-Richmond Heights) introduced Senate Bill 25 which would make significant changes to Ohio’s employment laws.
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• 2/4/2015
  Think You're Onto the Apps Your Kids are Into?
  Whitney Gibson, the leader of the firm’s internet defamation practice, authored a column, which was titled “Think You're Onto the Apps Your Kids are Into?,” for WCPO.com.
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• 2/2/2015
  Labor and Employment Alert: New Workplace Bullying Training Requirement in California
  This is a reminder to all employers with employees in California to implement the new workplace bullying training requirements that went into effect for California employers on January 1, 2015.
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• 2/2/2015
  FTC Is Cracking Down On 'Revenge Porn'
  Whitney Gibson, the leader of the firm’s internet defamation group, a Jordan Cohen, a member of the internet defamation group, authored an article for Privacy Law360 titled “FTC Is Cracking Down On 'Revenge Porn.’”
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January

• 1/30/2015
  Labor and Employment Alert: Wage Theft Prevention Acts: The Good - The Indifferent - And The Ugly
  As multistate employers are well aware, several states have enacted “wage theft prevention acts.” These laws are designed to ensure employees know how much they are being paid by requiring employers to provide detailed notices to employees on a set schedule, including at the time of hire. California and New York have had laws on wage theft for several years. Washington, D.C. enacted a new law late last year dealing with wage theft and making other, perhaps more disturbing, changes to wage and hour law in the District.
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• 1/27/2015
  How to Remove Defamatory News Articles from the Internet
  Negative media coverage has always posed a challenge for businesses and professionals. Given the current internet landscape and the ability of articles to spread quickly through social media, businesses must be especially active in trying to deal with bad publicity.
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• 1/26/2015
  • Victor J. Ferguson
  • David A. Groenke
  • Emily S. Pan
  • Michael G. Schwartz
  • David A. Swift
  • Mark E. Vannatta
  • Suzanne R. Galyardt
  It’s a New Year – Time to Review Your Estate Plan
  As the new year is in full swing, you may or may not have ditched your resolutions by now.
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• 1/23/2015
  Labor and Employment Alert: Labor and Employment Matters Front and Center in State of the Union
  President Obama delivered his sixth State of the Union address on Tuesday, and labor and employment matters took center stage. While the president’s address does not have the force of law, it highlights for employers what issues the White House plans on pursuing in the coming year.
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• 1/21/2015
  • Victor J. Ferguson
  • David A. Groenke
  • Emily S. Pan
  • Michael G. Schwartz
  • David A. Swift
  • Mark E. Vannatta
  Welcome to Legacy
  We hope you and your family enjoyed a happy holiday season. We’re writing to introduce you to a new e-newsletter we will begin publishing next week.
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• 1/20/2015
  Client Alert: U.S. Supreme Court Holds That Borrowers Need Only Give Notice of Intent to Rescind Under TILA within Three Years of Closing
  On January 13, 2015, the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of homeowners seeking to rescind their loans and mortgages with written notice to lenders within three years of completion of a real estate transaction, where lenders allegedly failed to comply with the federal Truth in Lending Act (TILA). Based on this decision in Jesinoski v. Countrywide Home Loans, Inc., it is not necessary that a homeowner actually file a court action within those three years.
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• 1/19/2015
  • M. Sean Purcell
  Don’t Buy an FCPA Problem in an Overseas Deal
  Justin Roberts, partner in the litigation group in the Cleveland office, and Sean Purcell, a partner in the corporate group in the Washington, D.C. office, authored an article for Crain’s Cleveland Business titled “Don’t Buy an FCPA Problem in an Overseas Deal.”
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