In October 2018, the Kentucky Supreme Court issued a far-reaching opinion voiding all Kentucky employer-employee arbitration agreements which were made a condition of an individual’s employment. On March 13, 2019, however, the Kentucky Legislature rejected that opinion, passing a bill that not only claws back the ruling but significantly expands employers’ options for imposing conditions on the employer-employee relationship.

On March 7, 2019, the U.S. Department of Labor unveiled its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”) recommending a scaled-back compromise to a controversial 2016 Obama-era overtime rule.

On February 4, 2019, the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland in Hagen Constr. Inc. v. Whiting-Turner Contracting Co., No. JKB-18-1201, 2019 BL 36862 (D. Md. Feb. 4, 2019), held that written “expressions of frustration” and “general complaints” made by a subcontractor regarding alleged project mismanagement were insufficient to sustain a labor inefficiency claim for additional project costs against the general contractor.

The latest iteration to replace the 2008 Rapanos Guidance and 2015 WOTUS Rule with a satisfactory definition of Waters of the United States was formally presented to the country on February 14, 2019 when the agencies published the Trump Administration’s Proposed Rule: “Revised Definition of Water of the United States” (“Proposed Rule”).