Sacramento Business Law Blog

Many women in Sacramento love Martha Stewart. Stewart almost singlehandedly rejuvenated American homemaking and entertaining as an art form and has been met with incredible success, launching a popular magazine, television show and line of home goods.

That last business venture, though, might be getting her into trouble. Department store Macy's Inc. recently sued her company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, over an agreement it entered into with rival department store J.C. Penney Co. Inc.

Readers in Sacramento have heard enough stories about Eastman Kodak Co. possibly filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy that they probably have developed the idea that the venerable film and camera company is circling the drain.

Regardless of the company's financial position, it still has some kick in it left. Kodak recently sued Apple, HTC, Fujifilm, Samsung and HTC after those companies allegedly infringed on patents that Kodak owns.

You would think that a business could hire whomever it wants as long as it is not obviously discriminating against, say, women or people of a certain ethnicity. But Sacramento business owners may be surprised to know that they have to be more careful than that since the government agencies that enforce our employment laws see discrimination everywhere.

Take the case of Pepsi Beverages, one of the largest Pepsi bottlers in the Midwest. It recently announced that it has to pay over $3 million to settle claims that it engaged in racial discrimination in reviewing job applicants. Furthermore, it has to extend job offers and provide employment training to applicants whom it chose not to hire and may have been affected by its allegedly discriminatory hiring policy.

In some cases, business owners do not decide to go forward with their venture until they feel assured that they will have enough business to keep them afloat, at least initially. That is why recent news that downtown Sacramento may not receive millions of dollars in redevelopment funds that it had been counting on could be bad news for the business formation front.

Sacramento has been trying to develop a dilapidated railyard and has been wanting to make improvements to the blighted K Street Mall for a long time. City leaders thought they were due to receive subsidies in the neighborhood of $80 million to finish these project, but now a state supreme court decision that upholds the legislature's decision to ban redevelopment agencies means that funding might never see the light of day.

Sacramento is not exactly close to Los Angeles, but readers here should care about what is going on there, since big news stories affect everyone in a state. That's why the employment law news that sheriff's deputies are suing the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, claiming that they were discriminated against on the basis of age and race, is important.

Four deputies are suing and three still work for the department. All four are suing separately.

Employers in California used to be able to check the credit score of a job applicant in the interest of making sure that the prospective hire has good judgment and is responsible, but starting this year, a new law is going to place significant restrictions on that ability.

Generally, employers will now only be able to check an applicant's credit score if he or she is applying for a managerial position or for a job that regularly deals with certain confidential information, like bank accounts and Social Security numbers. Laws like this are worth paying attention to because they shape corporate law compliance by changing the way companies must do business to stay in good legal standing.

Avery Dennison Corporation is based in Brea, a community in the Los Angeles metro area, but recent news related to the company is still relevant to Sacramento readers. That is because 3M, the Minnesota-based maker of innumerable office supplies (among many other products) recently announced it plans to acquire Avery Dennison's office-supplies and consumer goods unit for $550 million in cash.

That means a great many office supplies that Sacramento residents use every day, from Post-It Notes to certain brands of highlighters to Scotch Tape to file folders, may soon be made by 3M rather than the California-based Avery Dennison.

After much resistance on the part of former Hewlett-Packard chief Mark Hurd, a letter has been released that details some of the sexual harassment allegations made against him by a woman who formerly worked for Hewlett-Packard.

According to the letter, the alleged sexual harassment occurred when he tried to get the female company events contractor to have sexual intercourse with him and kissed and touched her when she was working for the company