California Assembly Bill 2699 (Gonzalez) is a bill to watch if you are a home improvement contractor that installs solar energy systems or, for that matter, a contractor in California. AB 2699 would, among other things, require the Contractors State License Board (CSLB) to develop a “solar energy system disclosure document”…
In A Double Standard in Construction Defect Coverage Cases?, I discuss the recent decision of Allied Property & Casualty Insurance Co. v. Metro North Condominium Associates. This decision highlights why only a minority of courts still hold to the fiction that construction defects cannot give rise to an “occurrence” covered…
In New Legislation Makes San Francisco the First City to Mandate Fully Paid Parental Leave for Employees, Pillsbury attorneys Paula Weber and Erica Turcios discuss the San Francisco Board of Supervisors’ unanimous approval of legislation that requires most San Francisco employees to receive six weeks of fully paid parental leave. Enforcement…
In San Francisco Gross Receipts Tax – Frequently Asked Questions from the Real Estate Industry, Pillsbury attorney Rachel Horsch discusses frequently asked questions posed by commercial real estate investors and operators regarding how the San Francisco Gross Receipts Tax (GRT) may apply to typical commercial real estate investments and transactions.…
In Supreme Court to Hear False Claims Act “Implied Certification” Appeal, we provide a primer for the oral argument that will be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court on April 19, 2016 in Universal Health Services v. United States ex rel. Escobar, No. 15-7. The Court is expected to resolve the…
In REIT Citizenship and the Impact of Americold Realty Trust on Jurisdictional Challenges, we discuss the Supreme Court’s unanimously ruling in Americold Realty Trust v. ConAgra Foods, Inc. that unincorporated entities organized as “real estate investment trusts” (REITs) under Maryland law are citizens of every state in which at least one…
EPA has spent almost 40 years wrestling with the definition of “solid waste” for purposes of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, 42 U.S.C. § 6901 et seq. (RCRA). The statutory definition of the term contemplates that it includes “any garbage, refuse, sludge from a waste treatment plant, water supply treatment plant, or air pollution control…
In Fabozzi v. Lexington Insurance Company, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has reaffirmed that ambiguities in an insurance policy must be construed against the insurer. The Fabozzis were renovating their home when they learned that its interior walls were so rotted that the entire house…
In our post Contractor Advertising in the Age of Social Media, we promised you a by-no-means exhaustive resource for the various laws, regulations and guidance on social media “advertising” for contractors throughout the United States. The following list is a state-by-state resource to help one get started navigating the never-uniform and always changing contractor…
Most states and, in some cases, cities that require a person to obtain a license, or register, to perform work as a contractor or specialty contractor (e.g., electrical, HVAC, plumbing, other specialized trade work) regulate what disclosures are required when the contractor advertises its services. Most commonly these laws or rules require the contractor to…