Industry association asks for full 9th Circuit review of ruling on hotel workers healthcare mandate

Back in March, a three-judge panel in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the city in a legal challenge to the its ordinance mandating that hotels provide healthcare benefits to their employees. As expected, the plaintiffs in the case, the ERISA Industry Committee (ERIC), have asked the full Ninth Circuit to hear the case en banc.

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ERIC revises its lawsuit challenging part of hotel-worker bill

When Initiative 124 passed, it attracted two lawsuits: one that tried to invalidate the entire bill, and another that attacked only one part: the requirement that hotel employers purchase health insurance for their employees.  Last summer, facing an almost certain loss  in the courts, Council member Mosqueda led an effort that repealed I-124 and replaced it with four separate, modified bills that she hoped would resolve the legal challenges in the two cases. But as expected today the plaintiff in the second case, ERIC, filed an updated complaint arguing that the rewritten bill requiring employers to provide healthcase, still violates …

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Hotel workers’ bills draw opposition at public hearing

This evening the City Council held a public hearing on four bills that Council members Mosqueda and Gonzalez have introduced as a replacement for Initiative 124. As expected, hotel workers and labor representatives showed up to urge the Council to pass the ordinances. But hotel managers and other small business owners also showed up in numbers to state their opposition to some of the provisions in the bills – particularly the health insurance mandate.

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