Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor announced their final rule regarding overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act. Effective January 1, 2020, the one-year salary threshold to qualify for executive, administrative, or professional employee exemptions will be raised to $35,568 (up from its current $23,660). The Department also made three changes to existing regulations: the rule (1.) raises the total annual compensation level for highly compensated employees from $100,000 to $107,432 per year; (2.) allows employers to use nondiscretionary bonuses and incentive pay to satisfy up to 10% of the standard salary level; and (3.) revises the special salary levels for workers in U.S. territories.

The final rule also abandoned a proposed provision that would have mandated salary threshold increases every four years; however, they did note their intention to address future increases more regularly than before. Overall, they mark a stark change from the previous administration’s attempt to increase the salary threshold to over $47,000, which was blocked by a federal judge in 2017.

Courtesy of FMI

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June 17th, 2019 – Augusta, ME – Governor Mills Signs Plastic Bag Ban Law. Beginning April 22, 2020 (Earth Day) single-use plastic bags will no longer be legal to provide at a retail establishment’s point of check-out. The law creates a consistent statewide single-use plastic bag policy (ban) and adds a 5¢ fee on paper bags and 4mm plastic bags (retained by the retailer).

“Beginning April 22, 2020 a retail establishment may use a recycled paper bag or a reusable bag made of plastic to bag products at the point of sale as long as the retail establishment charges a fee of at least 5¢ per bag. All amounts collected pursuant to this paragraph are retained by the retail establishment and may be used for any lawful purpose. A retail establishment may not rebate or otherwise reimburse a customer any portion of the fee charged pursuant to this paragraph.”

Click to read the Chaptered Law.

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Updated Guidance as of October 2019 via the ME DACF website for guidance.

What is the latest with CBD? Augusta, ME: July 10th – The State of Maine recently issued, ‘MAINE AGENCY GUIDELINES for ENFORCEMENT of PL 2019 Ch. 12[LD 630]’. To view the document, click here. LD 630 ‘An Act To Clarify That Food, Food Additives and Food Products Containing Hemp-derived Cannabidiol Produced and Sold within the State Are Not Adulterated and To Match the State’s Definition of “Hemp” to the Definition in Federal Law’ was signed into law by Governor Mills as an emergency measure on March 27, 2019.

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On May 8, 2019, Governor Janet Mills signed into law as PL 2019, chapter 79, An Act to Update
Alcohol Taste-Testing Requirements. The Legislature passed this bill out with an emergency
preamble which means these changes are in effect NOW.

The top line news here – we go from 3 tastings events per month to 15 events per month. An event
can include the taste-testing of beer, wine, spirits, a combination of two or more or all of these categories. Whatever the combination, this is considered one event for the purposes of taste-
testing. All very good and exciting news!!

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