Bail Bondsman in Sanford – New law requires large breeders to be licensed

Source     : Post Bulletin
By            : Heather J. Carlson
Category : Bail Bonds Sanford, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

New law requires large breeders to be licensed

Tucked in a back room of Paws and Claws Humane Society, beagles, puggles and chihauhuas rescued from a puppy mill jump up and down in kennels and bark as visitors walk by. When the 16 young adult dogs arrived on Friday, they were covered in animal feces and fleas, according to Shelter Manager Tanya Johnson. Some of the dogs appear to be pregnant. It’s not the first time the shelter has received dogs rescued from breeding operations and likely not the last. “It hasn’t been very common in the past, but it seems like lately we’ve gotten a few more of them than we normally have,” Johnson said.

Beginning on Wednesday, large commercial dog and cat breeders in Minnesota must be licensed by the state. In order to get licensed, these breeders must pay a fee and be inspected. Johnson is among those welcoming the new law. “It’s great. There are so many homeless pets, and I think getting a license will help breeders become more responsible,” she said. Not everyone is welcoming the new regulation. Belinda Donley, president of the Minnesota Pet Breeders Association, said her organization spent years battling at the Capitol to prevent a licensing law. She said the regulations aren’t about protecting animals. Instead, the law’s backers are really trying to shut down breeding operations. “We live in America and it’s legal to raise dogs and that’s the sad thing. They are trying to make it illegal to raise dogs for a living,” Donley said. The new regulations date back to a law passed by Minnesota legislators in 2013. It requires commercial cat and dog breeders that have at least 10 sexually-intact adult animals that produce more than five litters a year to be licensed annually by the Minnesota Board of Animal Health. Breeders who qualify must submit a license application and pay a fee of $10 per adult animal up to a maximum of $250. An inspection must be completed before the license is issued. This marks the first time the state has licensed dog and cat breeders, and those overseeing the program say it’s hard to know just how many of these large breeder operations are active in the state. Paul Anderson, a veterinarian overseeing the board’s inspection program, said last week his office was working with 50 to 60 breeders to get them licensed. His message to breeders who qualify for licensing — give the state a call. “Don’t be frightened. I know that people are very apprehensive that this will be a very difficult thing to do. Most of the people we have inspected so far have easily met these requirements,” Anderson said.

The board has 16 inspectors in locations across the state who can go out to breeder facilities. Anderson said inspectors will be using a 26-point checklist to make sure that the animals have access to clean water and food, get a chance to exercise and are receiving adequate health care. Inspectors will also check the size of shelters being used for the animals. Anderson warned that the state will seek out commercial breeders who fail to register with the state. “I think some of them are waiting to see if we can find them, and we will. We know how to do this. Eventually we will find all of our folks that qualify as commercial breeders,” Anderson said. One of the groups that led the charge for the new law was the Animal Humane Society of Minnesota. The group’s Chief Government Affairs Officer Kathy Mock said the only time these breeding operations were inspected was if a complaint was lodged. The nonprofit employs two humane agents who investigate cases of possible animal cruelty across the state. “You get called in after the animals are already in dire straits,” Mock said. “So this will allow the Board of Animal Health to be proactive and actually go in and inspect the kennels.” The nonprofit’s main concern moving forward is that the regulations are

“That’s going to be key for the successful implementation of the law,” she said. When the law passed in 2013, Austin DFL Rep. Jeanne Poppe was chairwoman of the House Agriculture Policy Committee. For years, efforts to regulate dog and cat breeders had stalled in that committee in the face of strong opposition. But the tide turned in 2013 when the bill’s sponsor, Rep. John Lesch, was able to get the Minnesota Farmers Union and other key groups on board.
Poppe said she believes the new licensing law is reasonable. “This helps to level the playing field so that those who are doing the right thing get recognized and those who weren’t doing the right thing may go out of business or may clean up their act,” Poppe said.

Kevin Chirhart, owner of Bear Creek Springers, has mixed feelings about the new law. He has spent the past 16 years raising English springer spaniels. His Racine operation is much smaller than those required to be licensed by the state. He said his nine dogs generally produce one or two litters of puppies per year. For him, it’s a hobby and the puppies raised are considered family pets.On the one hand, he said he can understand breeders being upset about the additional regulations. But he said he can also see possible benefits to the new rules. “I don’t know if I’m truly for (the new law),” Chirhart said. “I guess if it helps regulate some of the puppy mills, then I think it’s a good thing.”

Read More : postbulletin.com/news/politics/new-law-requires-large-breeders-to-be-licensed/article_9e26eb44-3f9a-51b4-a9c7-19927eb30f66.html

Bail Bonds Sanford – Gay marriage declared legal across the US in historic supreme court ruling

Source    : The Guardian
By           : Diane C. Lade
Category: Bail Bonds Sanford, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Gay marriage declared legal across the US in historic supreme court ruling

Same-sex marriages are now legal across the entirety of the United States after a historic supreme court ruling that declared attempts by conservative states to ban them unconstitutional. In what may prove the most important civil rights case in a generation, five of the nine court justices determined that the right to marriage equality was enshrined under the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment. Victory in the case – known as Obergefell v Hodges, after an Ohio man who sued the state to get his name listed on his late husband’s death certificate – capped years of campaigning by LGBT rights activists, high-powered attorneys and couples waiting decades for the justices to rule. It immediately led to scenes of jubilation from coast to coast, as campaigners, politicians and everyday people – gay, straight and in-between – hailed “a victory of love”. The ruling, in which Justice Anthony Kennedy cast the deciding vote, means the number of states where gay marriage is legal will rise – albeit after some stalling – from 37 to 50.’ “They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law,” Kennedy wrote in his opinion for the majority. “The Constitution grants them that right.” Speaking from the White House after calling one of the plaintiffs, Barack Obama said the decision would “end the patchwork system we currently have”. “This ruling is a victory for America,” the president said. “This decision affirms what millions of Americans already believe in their hearts: when all Americans are treated as equal, we are all more free.” Four liberal justices and Kennedy rejected claims made by lawyers during the legal argument in April that marriage was defined by law solely to encourage procreation within stable family units – and therefore could only meaningfully apply to men and women.

“The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,” wrote Kennedy. “The petitioners in these cases seek to find that liberty by marrying someone of the same sex and having their marriages deemed lawful on the same terms and conditions as marriages between persons of the opposite sex,” he added. Crucially, the majority ruling argues that the court has frequently exercised jurisdiction over the definition of marriage in previous cases and is not overstepping its constitutional role by intervening now. “This Court’s cases have expressed constitutional principles of broader reach. In defining the right to marry these cases have identified essential attributes of that right based in history, tradition and other constitutional liberties inherent in this intimate bond,” wrote Kennedy.

Scenes of happiness

The crowd outside the court – indeed, across the country – erupted in joy after the ruling was handed down, with many longtime campaigners crying tears of joy and embracing their partners. Chants of “Love has won” reverberated among the hundreds gathered below the court steps and across the street outside the US Capitol, as rainbow flags intertwined with the American flag. Among the crowd was California representative Mark Takano, an openly gay member of Congress who described being at the scene as both “profound and pointed”. “I feel like the supreme court has just thrown a huge wedding bouquet to LGBT people all across the country and couples are going to be rushing to catch that bouquet,” Takano told the Guardian. Takano nonetheless cautioned that there remained legal obstacles ahead, insisting that a comprehensive civil rights act would be required to ensure that LGBT individuals do not face housing and employment discrimination, among other barriers. But he was optimistic that the ruling had set the tone.
“The arc of history is quite clear that the struggle for LGBT equality is part of our civil rights,” Takano said. Judd Proctor, a 65-year-old resident of Silver Spring, Maryland, said he never thought he would live to see the day that gay marriage would be a constitutional right. “When I first met my partner 20 years ago, I never thought there would be marriage. We had a commitment ceremony,” he told the Guardian outside the court.

    We never dreamed of getting married, of having children. It’s a completely different environment now.
    Sue Simmons, Connecticut

Jaque Roberts, left, and her partner of 31 years, Carmelita Cabello, right, show off their marriage license in Austin, Texas. Randy Johnson, a plaintiff in one of the concurrent cases brought from Kentucky before the court with his partner Paul Campion, said he still had goosebumps, hours after their 20-year-old son had texted them two words: “We won.” “As soon as we heard the news, we were obviously in tears, and obviously overcome with emotion because this is the most amazing event we could imagine,” Johnson told the Guardian. Georgia was one of several states that began to issue marriage licenses immediately following the decision. Kathie DeNobriga, the mayor of Atlanta suburb Pine Lake who married her long-term partner out of state last year as one of the few openly gay politicians in the American south, called the court ruling “a victory of love in opposition to fear”. “It was like I was sneaking away to get married,” she said. “Now we all have not the privilege, but a right to get married where we are.” Legal same-sex weddings were taking place for the first time on Friday across Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota and Tennessee, even as the attorneys general in Texas and Mississippi said marriages could not take place immediately. Texas attorney general Ken Paxton issued a long statement suggesting he would attempt to fight the legalisation of gay marriage by asserting the “religious liberties” of clerks and officials.

Louisiana attorney general Buddy Caldwell also released a statement saying that the decision “overturns the will of the people of Louisiana” and that “nothing in today’s decision makes the court’s order effective immediately”. But Mississippi attorney general Jim Hood later backtracked after initially ordering clerks not to issue licenses “immediately”. He subsequently clarified that his office “is certainly not standing in the way of the supreme court’s decision”. Two gay couples waited at the state vital records office in New Orleans to get their marriage licenses. And waited, and waited. Earl Benjamin, 39, and Michael Robinson, 41, arrived moments after the supreme court’s announcement. But they hit a wall of bureaucracy, saying officials told them there would be a delay as they had to reboot the computer system and were “waiting for clearance”. The pair felt that officials were deliberately dragging their heels. “It’s mixed emotions for sure. For us right now it’s become painfully clear that there’s some resistance to us getting a license,” Robinson said, the two clutching flowers and boxes of cupcakes brought by friends who had arrived to congratulate them.

Benjamin said it was frustrating to see heterosexual couples arrive and leave with their licenses without any problem, though “each of those couples has come over to us and said congratulations.” The couple, who have been together 14 years, were willing to wait all day. But in the early afternoon, after they had been sitting in the office for four-and-a-half hours, they were told by an official that the state would not be issuing marriage licenses today as it waits for a ruling by the federal fifth circuit appeals court, which also took up the issue. That will be a formality given the supreme court’s decision. “We’re still excited but we’re also a bit saddened that we weren’t able to get our license today,” Benjamin said after leaving the office. “You become accustomed to discrimination, you come to expect it … We’re going to be looking forward to marrying each other soon.” Every summer Friday, the Wayne County clerk’s office in Detroit holds mass wedding ceremonies to accommodate the seasonal increase in marriages. On Friday, that included same-sex marriages, though the county clerk’s office didn’t have a specific number just before it closed for the day. “There’s really been nothing different, we’ve just been handling things like we do every business day,” said Jina Sawani, a spokesperson for the office.

Starting on Monday, mass weddings will be held at the office every weekday at 3pm. George Harris, 82, and Jack Evans, 85, kiss after being married by Judge Garcia on Friday in Dallas County. Photograph: Tony Gutierrez/AP
In a nod to an argument colorfully expressed by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg during the hearing, the ruling also rejects the notion that the state definition of marriage rests on the ability of couples to procreate. “That is not to say the right to marry is less meaningful for those who do not or cannot have children,” writes Kennedy, after pointing out the advantages for children of same-sex couples. “An ability, desire, or promise to procreate is not and has not been a prerequisite for a valid marriage in any State.” And in perhaps the most sweeping section of the lengthy ruling, Kennedy rejected the concern expressed by chief justice John Roberts that the court should not get too far ahead of traditional conceptions of marriage that are limited to a man and a woman.

“The right to marry is fundamental as a matter of history and tradition, but rights come not from ancient sources,” writes Kennedy. “They rise, too, from a better informed understanding of how constitutional imperatives define a liberty that remains urgent in our own era.” In one of four separate dissents, Roberts attacked the decision, arguing: “This Court is not a legislature. Whether same-sex marriage is a good idea should be of no concern to us. Under the Constitution, judges have power to say what the law is, not what it should be.” But the five justices in the majority argued that depriving them of marriage equality “serve[d] to disrespect and subordinate” gay and lesbian people. “It is now clear that the challenged laws burden the liberty of same-sex couples, and it must be further acknowledged that they abridge central precepts of equality,” they argued. “Especially against a long history of disapproval of their relationships, this denial to same-sex couples of the right to marry works a grave and continuing harm.” Lawyers advising couples looking to take advantage of the historic ruling warned that it could take some time for states to react.

“Uniform implementation of the ruling state by state will undoubtedly take time,” said Robert Stanley, a partner in Beverly Hills family law firm Jaffe and Clemens. “Certainly, some states are expected to rebel and stall implementation as long as possible.” The nation’s highest tribunal last weighed marriage equality in 2012, with challenges to California’s effective ban on same-sex marriages, known as Proposition 8, and a key provision of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (Doma). The justices then ruled in favor of marriage equality proponents, but ducked the question of whether gay marriage was a constitutional right. Roberta Kaplan, the lawyer who successfully argued the Doma case, said “there is nothing” in Friday’s ruling that she was concerned about that could lead to major legal challenges.

“This is the pinnacle of our success so far,” she told the Guardian. “It is hard for me to see now that any court, anywhere, state or federal, could possibly tolerate discrimination against gay people on any basis.” The rulings nonetheless kicked off a wave of decisions among courts across the country that struck down state-level bans on same-sex marriage and accelerated a trend that has seen the number of states allowing such weddings soar from just two in 2008, to all 50 in 2015 – plus the District of Columbia, from where a national celebration was only beginning on Friday morning. The US becomes the 21st country to recognise same-sex marriage across the country.

“Love is love,” Obama said.

Read More :  theguardian.com/society/2015/jun/26/gay-marriage-legal-supreme-court

Bondsman in Seminole County – New Texas law, legal actions prompt repeal of fracking ban

Source     : Watch Dog
By            : Lou Ann Anderson
Category : Bondsman in Seminole county, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

New Texas law, legal actions prompt repeal of fracking ban

The Denton City Council voted 6-1 early Wednesday morning to “strategically repeal” the city’s hydraulic fracturing ban just seven months after it was approved by what some headlines proclaimed as a “landslide” victory. Citing the ban as “unenforceable” due to a new state law, the council, in a statement, explained “it is in the overall interest of the Denton taxpayers to strategically repeal the ordinance.” Denton, just north of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, has long appeared to have aspirations of growing up to be like Austin. A liberal vibe emanates from this college town with, per 2013 United States Census estimates, a population of 123,000. It is home to the University of North Texas and Texas Woman’s University. Denton’s fracking ban – a first of its kind in Texas – was cheered by environmentalists and other liberal activists, and seemed in keeping with Austin’s slogan to “Keep Austin Weird.”

The ban, however, had its problems. First, in response to Denton’s action, the state of Texas used its recent legislative session to pass and immediately implement House Bill 40, a measure that reasserts the state’s exclusive jurisdiction to regulate oil and gas operations in the state and expressly precludes local governments’ regulation of such operations. But even before this new law, the city faced legal challenges as immediately after the ban’s ballot victory, the Texas General Land Office and the Texas Oil and Gas Association both filed lawsuits. Calling the ban “‘arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable’ prohibition,” then-Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson filed a lawsuit seeking a permanent injunction. “This ban on hydraulic fracturing is not constitutional and it won’t stand,” Patterson said. “If it were allowed to be enforced it would hurt the schoolchildren of Texas, who earn hundreds of millions of dollars a year on oil and gas production on Permanent School Fund lands.”

The Texas Oil & Gas Association (TXOGA) also filed an action asking for injunctive relief against the city, citing grounds that a fracking ban is inconsistent with state law and therefore violates the Texas Constitution. Both parties amended their lawsuits earlier this week citing HB 40 as a basis to overturn the ban and disallow the city’s moratorium on new drilling permits. According to the Denton Record-Chronicle, a footnote in the latest filings said the group could also ask for attorneys’ fees. The paper further noted that in addition to the city, the lawsuits name the Denton Drilling Advisory Group, a group reportedly formed “at the request of a city government official to provide expert and public input while the city council developed drilling ordinances” along with Earthworks, a national nonprofit advocacy group, as co-defendants.

In its statement, the city also noted that the ban’s repeal “potentially reduces ongoing court costs and attorneys fees related to ongoing litigation” and that it also “significantly mitigates problems and perceptions associated with operational discrepancies between the ban ordinance and newly-adopted state law, to which the City is bound to comply.” The statement concludes: “Council members emphasize this decision was not taken lightly, and that the City Council is looking to the long-term interests of this city by balancing all concerns and concluding the litigation on the matter.”

Read More :  watchdog.org/225006/new-texas-law-legal-actions-prompt-repeal-fracking-ban/

Bail Bondsman in Sanford – Kansas Links Court Funding to Judicial Rulings

Source    :  Blogs WSJ
By            : Joe Palazzolo
Category : Bail Bonds Sanford, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Kansas Links Court Funding to Judicial Rulings

Kanas Gov. Sam Brownback has signed legislation that would eliminate funding for the state’s courts if they overturn a contentious law passed last year, a move experts described as an unprecedented display of legislative power. The 2014 law, pushed by Republicans, stripped the Kansas Supreme Court of the power to appoint chief judges for the lower courts. A Kansas judge has sued to block it. Legal experts said the law signed late Thursday is likely the first instance of lawmakers tying a judicial budget to the outcome of a legal case. The budget language will almost certainly be challenged in court, but activists warned that the effects of triggering the clause could be far-reaching. It’s unclear whether or how long the courts could operate without a budget in place. Courts would be unable to sign off on search and arrest warrants, issue protective orders or preside over constitutionally-mandated first appearances for people arrested for crimes, they said. The 2014 law gave local courts the authority to select their own chief judges. The lawsuit pending in Shawnee County District Court, in northeastern Kansas, says the 2014 law violates a provision of the state constitution giving the Kansas Supreme Court “general administrative authority over all courts in the state.”

The bill signed by Gov. Brownback, a Republican, says that if that 2014 law is “stayed or is held to be invalid or unconstitutional,” the other provisions including funding for the courts are “declared to be null and void.” Republican lawmakers denied any link between the language, known in legislative parlance as a non-severability clause, and the pending lawsuit.

Democrats, meanwhile, said the legislation is part of a vendetta against the courts for a series of rulings on education funding. The Kansas Supreme Court has ruled twice that public-school funding was unconstitutionally inadequate. Soon after the most recent ruling, the legislature passed the law limiting the administrative authority of the court. A spokeswoman for the Kansas courts said she could not comment, given the ongoing litigation. “The Supreme Court will not respond to inquiries about legal questions such as those that arise in that suit and may come before the Supreme Court on appeal,” said Lisa Taylor, spokeswoman for the Office of Judicial Administration.

Read More :  blogs.wsj.com/law/2015/06/05/kansas-passes-law-linking-court-funding-to-judicial-rulings/

Bail Bonds Sanford – Citizenship laws will be tested in the High Court, legal expert says

Source     : SBS
By            : Catherine McGrath
Category : Bail Bonds Sanford, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Citizenship laws will be tested in the High Court, legal expert says

The Bill, known as the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Allegiance to Australia) Act 2015, has been introduced into Parliament. It amends section 35 of the Citizenship Act and allows citizenship to be lost if a dual national overseas ‘fights for, or is in the service of, a declared terrorist organisation’ or if a person in Australia is convicted of a terrorist offence. “The real question underpinning these changes is that some of the provisions they are changing [in the Citizenship Act[ have never been tested constitutionally,” said Professor Rubenstein, who is Director of the Centre for International and Public Law at Australian National University.

“For instance, Section 35, that was the section that stated that you lost your citizenship automatically if you took up arms for a country at war with Australia. “[It] has been expanded but that provision was never tested as to whether it is constitutional. In essence this new change is going to give us opportunity to test out whether that provision at its base was constitutional and whether these changes are consistent constitutionally. Professor Rubenstein said the loss of citizenship will greatly affect someone’s status in Australia’s democratic system. “The loss of citizenship is a very dramatic change in a person’s status in our democratic system and so the question is: to what extent is there a restriction on the Commonwealth’s power to remove someone’s citizenship and deprive them of their citizenship? “There are questions of the separation of powers for automatic loss of citizenship.” The legislation is a key part of Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s fight against home grown terrorism.

Today Mr Abbott and senior ministers visited ASIO headquarters in Canberra prior to the legislation being introduced into parliament. They were briefed by the Director General of Security Duncan Lewis who said radicalised young people in Australia are mainly from areas in Sydney and Melbourne. They are being radicalised very quickly via the internet he said, and it is happening at a younger age. Most of the people being targeting are not known to Australian authorities. Mr Abbott said the new laws will help protect Australians. “People who leave Australia to fight with terrorist armies in the Middle East are committing the modern form of treason. And I guess to strip the citizenship from the terrorists who are dual nationals is, if you like, the modern form of banishment.” Labor has indicated it will support the legislation. Professor Rubenstein, who is the author of the book Australian Citizenship Law, believes it will end up in the High Court. “There will be really interesting questions that the Court will have to grapple with, as it no doubt it will when someone is found to have lost their citizenship under these provisions. It will have to determine whether in fact this is something the Commonwealth has the power to do.”

Read More : sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/06/24/citizenship-laws-will-be-tested-high-court-legal-expert-says

Bail Bondsman in Sanford – You Can Now Get a Degree in Fashion Law

Source    :  Fashionista
By            : Dhani Mau
Category : Bondsman in Seminole county, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

You Can Now Get a Degree in Fashion Law-Fordham is launching two first-of-its-kind degrees in fashion law

A big milestone in the melding of fashion and law took place in New York on Monday. Susan Scafidi, the director of Fordham University’s Fashion Law Institute and a pioneer in establishing this field of study, along with Diane von Furstenberg and Fordham Provost Stephen Freedman, announced the launch of two academic degree programs in fashion law — the first not only at Fordham, but in the world. Those who already have a general law degree can apply now for the Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Fashion Law program, which starts in the fall. It will include courses on topics like fashion financing, fashion modeling law, fashion licensing and sustainability.

Perhaps even more significantly, Fordham is also offering a degree program for non-lawyers, called a Master of Studies in Law (M.S.L.), designed for industry professionals who want to learn more about laws pertaining to fashion and retail. “We’ve all heard that ignorance of the law is no defense, but law schools have done everything they can to make sure that everyone but lawyers are ignorant of the law,” Scafidi said at a press conference Monday morning. “It’s time in a new era of transparency to open that up and to allow people to have the legal knowledge they need to make important business decisions.” Both programs are available on a part-time or full-time basis. Students can matriculate in the fall or spring and if taken full-time, the programs take two semesters to complete.

Establishing the field of fashion law has been a bit of an uphill battle (readers of our sister site Above the Law have doubted its existence altogether), and one that Scafidi says she couldn’t have won without help from the CFDA and its president, Diane von Furstenberg, whom she called the “patron saint” of fashion law. At the press conference, von Furstenberg stressed the importance of understanding intellectual property law, particularly for designers. (In fact, the CFDA, with help from Scafidi, tried, and failed, to pass a design protection bill back in 2010.) This may seem obvious to people in the industry, but for members of the legal profession, fashion has not always been taken seriously.

“The challenges were bureaucratic,” said Scafidi, who has been trying to establish degree programs in fashion law for more than five years. “Trying to convince the American Bar Association and the State of New York to give the green light to degrees in a field they’d never heard of was a challenge.” Fordham probably won’t have a hard time getting people to enroll — Scafidi says that 25 percent of people who inquire about Fordham inquire specifically about fashion law. However, the cost could be prohibitive for some: Tuition for the 2015/2016 academic year is $53,440 for the LL.M. The M.S.L. program will be 25 percent cheaper — about $40,000. That said, the school is looking into raising scholarship funds.

As for what kinds of careers a lawyer might have with such a degree, Scafidi says she’s seeing more big law firms in New York with specific departments for fashion, luxury and retail. “Why would they hire someone other than people who know the field, as opposed to having to learn it on the job?”

Read More : fashionista.com/2015/06/fordham-fashion-law-degree-program

Bondsman in Seminole county – Supreme Court could review Texas abortion law

Source    :  Boston Globe
By            :  Mark Sherman Associated Press
Category :  Bondsman in Seminole county, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Supreme Court could review Texas abortion law

Abortion is back before the Supreme Court, and the justices could signal by the end of June whether they are likely to take up the biggest case on the hot-button subject in nearly a quarter-century. If the court steps in, the hearing and the eventual ruling would come amid the 2016 presidential campaign. The court is considering an emergency appeal from abortion providers in Texas, who want the justices to block two provisions of a state law that already has forced the closure of roughly half the licensed abortion clinics in the state. Ten of the remaining 19 clinics will have to shut their doors by July 1. The Texas law is among a wave of state measures in recent years that have further restricted when abortions may be performed, imposed limits on abortions using drugs instead of surgery, and increased standards for clinics and the doctors who work in them.

The Texas case involves the last of these categories. The provisions at issue require clinics to meet hospital-like surgical standards and also call on doctors who work in the clinics to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.
Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry signed the law in 2013 when he was the state’s governor. Backers of the law say those are common-sense measures intended to protect women. Abortion rights groups say the regulations have only one aim: to make it harder, if not impossible, for women to get abortions in Texas. The case could be attractive to the justices because it might allow them to give more definition to the key phrase from their last big abortion ruling, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, in 1992. States generally can regulate abortion unless doing so places “an undue burden” on a woman’s right to get an abortion.

“Courts have been fumbling for years about what does it mean to be undue under Casey,” said Priscilla Smith, a Yale Law School professor and defender of abortion rights. Some abortion opponents also see the case as a strong candidate for Supreme Court review. “The likelihood of this case getting to the Supreme Court is very high, and I think that’s a good thing,” said Mike Norton, senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian-oriented public interest law firm.

The justices blocked the two provisions once before, in November 2014 while the New Orleans-based Fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals was weighing whether those parts of the law violate a woman’s right to an abortion. The appeals court upheld the provisions June 9 and has since refused to put its ruling on hold while the clinics appeal to the Supreme Court. In 2013, four justices — enough to hear an appeal — said the high court probably would want to weigh in. In an earlier phase of the same case, Justice Stephen Breyer wrote that the court probably would take up the controversial provisions. Justice Anthony Kennedy’s views will probably determine the outcome in this case, as in so many other divisive issues. Kennedy was one of the three authors of the Casey opinion that reaffirmed a woman’s right to an abortion and struck down a Pennsylvania requirement that women tell their husbands before getting an abortion. But he also wrote the 2007 opinion that upheld a federal ban on an abortion procedure that opponents call partial-birth abortion.

Read More : bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2015/06/21/supreme-court-may-review-texas-abortion-law/qfiMtDpSUunnH7cZc9JD9I/story.html

Bail Bond Seminole County – Breast-milk pumping at work is legal, but needs more support

Source    :  WRAL News
By            : LAUREN SLAVIN, The Herald-Times
Category: Bail Bond Seminole County, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Breast-milk pumping at work is legal, but needs more support

Margie Schrader did it in her office. Kirstin Milks did it in her classroom. Jami Hamman did it in her cubicle. And Jean Bauer did it wherever she could find a lockable door. “I pumped in bathrooms, closets,” Bauer said. Bauer started breast-feeding immediately after giving birth to her daughter, Lillian, in 2009. Because she was a nursing student at Ivy Tech, Bauer could only take a month off for maternity leave before returning to school and student clinical work at IU Health Bloomington Hospital. Every two to three hours of her 12-hour nursing shifts, Bauer needed to find a private space to set up her breast pump, pump enough breast milk to feed her daughter the following day and dismantle and clean her equipment for later use. “It was frowned upon,” Bauer remembers six years later. “You don’t leave clinic. You’re here to learn and do this full time. You can’t just leave.” Even as a student, Bauer was experiencing the frustration of many new working moms— making time in their busy 9-to-5 (or longer) schedules to pump breast milk, and often having to explain to employers that taking a break to pump is their right, protected by federal and state law. Bauer is one of the 70.1 percent of mothers participating in the workforce who have children younger than 18, according to 2014 data from the U.S. Department of Labor. Mothers with young children are less likely to be in the workforce. Last year, the participation rate for mothers with children 6 or younger was just 64.2 percent. For mothers with infants younger than 1, it was 57.1 percent. Returning to work after giving birth is a major worry for many new moms, said Ann Marie Neeley, an International Board Certified Lactation consultant with St. Vincent Women’s Hospital. Neeley teaches classes on breast-feeding and pumping, and said it can be difficult to focus a lesson on starting to breast-feed successfully when more than half of the women in the room plan to return to their offices in a matter of weeks.

“They’re already jumping ahead in their mind past maternity leave and wanting to know how they’re going to go back to work,” Neeley told The Herald-Times. Some mothers even hesitate about starting to breast-feed when they know they’ll need to pump soon after. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 2014 Breastfeeding Report Card showed that 74.1 percent of Hoosier infants born in 2011 had breast-fed at some point, but only 38.6 percent of infants were breast-feeding at 6 months, after many mothers return to their jobs. The national average for breast-feeding at 6 months was 49.4 percent. Even fewer infants in Indiana, 21.5 percent compared with the national average of 26.7 percent, were breast-feeding at 12 months. “Initiating and maintaining breast-feeding while going back to work is a daunting task for anyone,” said Dr. Jennifer Walthall, deputy state health commissioner. “The barriers are many; the supports are many; and the long- term goal is to make the support outweigh the barriers.” Now, the Indiana State Department of Health is focusing on increased breast-feeding as a part of its larger Labor of Love initiative to reduce infant mortality in the state. Indiana has had one of the nation’s highest rates of infant mortality for years, and Gov. Mike Pence has asked the state health department to makes its No. 1 priority reducing the number of babies who die before their first birthday. By 2020, the state health department hopes to increase the rate of breast-feeding at 6 months to 60.6 percent, according to the state’s 2015 breast-feeding strategic plan. “We know across the board that breastfeeding has many significant benefits not only to infants, but their mothers as well,” Walthall said. Another aspect of the state’s breast-feeding initiative is educating employers and employees on women’s right to pump in the workplace, and Hoosier women’s right to breast-feed wherever a woman has a legal right to be. When the federal Affordable Care Act became law in 2010, break time for mothers to pump breast milk at work also was added to the Fair Labor Standards Act. Businesses with more than 50 employees must provide a private place that is not a bathroom, and will be undisturbed by co-workers, for employees to express breast milk for up to one year after a child is born. For Margie Schrader, who returned to work as an assistant city attorney for the city of Bloomington in 2009 after giving birth to her daughter, Zadie, that space was her office, with use of the employee break room fridge to store her expressed milk. “I would lock my door and put out my sign. You’ve got your tubes and your flanges and the part that connects the tubes to the flanges is like three parts, so you have to put all those together,” she said. “After a while it was just so easy I could turn it on and keep working. I didn’t make any phone calls, but I could keep working on my computer.”

“I tried to make it feel as normal as I could and project that to everyone. This is just a normal thing that I’m doing because I’m feeding my baby this way. Nipples and breasts are what they are.” The ACA does not pre-empt more extensive state laws that provide additional protections to breast-feeding mothers. Indiana is one of 27 states and the District of Columbia with a law related to breast-feeding in the workplace, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Hoosier working mothers have had a lactation law on the books since 2008. Employees of businesses with more than 25 employees have the right to pump breast milk in a private location other than a bathroom toilet stall during a paid or unpaid break. Employers should also make efforts to provide a cold storage space for storing an employee’s breast milk, or allow the employee to bring her own for use until the end of the work day. Lactation rooms do not need to become permanent installations in a business, but can be created as needed. “It’s one thing to write a rule or a code or a law, but it’s another thing to educate and make it possible to do,” Walthall said. Health workers, however, are still fighting to uphold the law. Unlike the federal law, which is enforced by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division, Indiana’s law does not have a provision to enforce it. “Even though there’s a law to protect them, there’s no teeth to the law,” Neeley said. “There’s no consequence for not following the law.” A complaint would have to be filed not with the state, but with the federal Department of Labor for a noncomplying workplace to be investigated, said Tina Cardarelli, state breast-feeding coordinator for the Indiana Perinatal Network. Even six years after enacting the law, health officials are also combating an uninformed public. “I speak to companies pretty much every day that don’t know there is a law,” Cardarelli said. “Businesses will argue the point with me, ‘Well, what’s going to happen to us if we don’t do it?’ Well, nothing, actually.” When the lights are off in Kirstin Milks’ classroom, her students say she’s “busy being a mom.”

The Bloomington High School South science teacher conveniently gave birth to her daughter, Nemora Cloud, at the end of the school year, and was able to take summer vacation as an extended maternity leave. When school started again in the fall, Milks was still breast-feeding, and had to pump at least twice during the school day. “It’s one thing for office workers to take a break, but I needed to schedule me without children at certain times so I could sit and pump,” Milks said. “Because it was totally obvious to my supervisor that I’d given birth to a kid and this is what I needed, they gave me the schedule that I needed.” Support in the workplace is critical to allow breast-feeding mothers to continue pumping, Neeley said. But that often takes a new mother who feels comfortable explaining the law to her boss and fighting for a place close to her work station where she can pump without being interrupted or disturbed by co-workers. “I feel like women who may not be as outspoken for their needs and don’t stand up for themselves like they should, they’re not going to be able to get that, and that’s sad,” said Jami Hamman, who works at Indiana University’s Office of Environmental, Health and Safety Management and has a 20-month-old daughter named Katelin.

Hamman pumps in her cubicle, which has high walls and a lockable door. “I had to listen to all the people around me working and talking, which doesn’t let you fully relax and be able to let the milk flow,” Hamman said. “To give the person time to actually take nursing breaks is very difficult, obviously with different people’s jobs and depending on how much management support they have.” “I can see where the employer could get frustrated. But at the same time, the benefits far outweigh it. I think when a mom feels that she’s supported, she’s going to work better and harder in the long run.” IU, Bloomington’s largest employer, has 12 privacy rooms across campus for use by pumping moms, which can either be accessed on a first-come, first-served basis, or can be reserved with the building or department providing the space. Each building and department hosting a lactation or nursing room is responsible for the room’s use and upkeep, Jenny Fleetwood, work-life balance coordinator for university human resources, said in an email. The Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce has approximately 153 member businesses with more than 25 employees, based on data businesses voluntarily provided to the chamber. Neither the Bloomington Chamber, nor the statewide Indiana Chamber of Commerce have received negative feedback from member businesses since the federal and state breast-feeding laws were enacted, Jeb Conrad, president and CEO of the Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce, said in an email. “Knowing our members, I would expect they would comply in order to not only meet the requirement, but also accommodate their valuable workforce,” Conrad said. IU Health Bloomington Hospital, the city’s third-largest employer, has two specific places in the hospital for lactation: a convenience room near the Outpatient Surgery area, and another on the Mother Baby Unit on the second floor, hospital spokeswoman Amanda Roach said in an email. “In my experience, most employers want to support breast-feeding moms and want their employees to be happy and will do what they need to do,” Neeley said. “I think when there’s a lactation policy in place, everyone in the workplace needs to be educated about it and why it’s important.”

Read More :  http://www.wral.com/breast-milk-pumping-at-work-is-legal-but-needs-more-support/14721541/

Bail Bondsman in Sanford – Spring is here and Legal Tech is in the air

Source     : Business Financial Post
By             : Mitch Kowalski
Category : Bondsman in Seminole county, Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Spring is here and Legal Tech is in the air

Recently Shopify Inc.’s recent $131-million IPO made headlines. Understandably the transaction involved hundreds of legal documents being  circulated among scores of professional service firms including accountants, investment banks, and law firms in the United States and Canada. What was not mentioned in the news was that Shopify turned to software developed by Toronto legal tech start-up, Closing Folders, to securely and efficiently manage all of these documents during the entire transaction. In the past, complex legal transactions were traditionally completed in boardrooms filled with hundreds of paper folders, but Closing Folders’ brings this process into the 21st century. “We were very glad to have used Closing Folders for our transaction,” said Erin Zipes, Assistant General Counsel of Shopify. “It made pre-closing and closing very smooth.  A boardroom full of paper documents was just not our style.”

Closing Folders’ genius is in its roots.  Founded in 2013, by two ex-Bay St. lawyers, Sahil Zaman and Gordon Cassie, the product was built from the ground up to integrate seamlessly into the corporate lawyers’ workflow.  “We wanted Closing Folders to feel natural for corporate lawyers so we focused the product around the closing agendas that they use every day,” said Sahil Zaman, President and Co-Founder of the company. “As we built it, we realized we could also start automating a lot of time consuming tasks like collecting signature pages and creating closing books.” James Padwick is an early adopter of Closing Folders who has seen first hand the time it can save him and his clients.  Working on secured lending transactions at Wildeboer Dellelce LLP, James has been a regular user of the product since its earliest days.  “Closing Folders has drastically optimized my workflow and can easily decrease the time and cost spent chasing paper, saving clients thousands of dollars per deal and adding efficiency” says James.  “Clients want fast answers, lawyers want control of their documents, and nobody wants to pay for paper pushing.  Closing Folders achieves all of this.”

Lawyerlinx

Also, in late May, Lawyerlinx.com launched a consumer-facing link to Canadian lawyers and legal services. The website is a consumer-friendly, free resource for Canadians in need of legal services and which contains a number of tools such as, Find a Lawyer which details area of law, location, billing options, hourly rate and languages spoken by the lawyer. The site also includes the On Demand Legal Services™ tool to submit a request for legal services and receive proposals for legal services from vetted lawyers – free of charge. Finally, the Legal Match™ tool is designed to access what type of lawyer and legal services a user requires and using a proprietary algorithm, matches them to the most suitable lawyer in the LawyerLinx network. LawyerLinx.com, the brainchild of Toronto Lawyer Edyta Kowalewska, who was inspired by her desire to inform and empower consumers of legal services and provide a streamlined, consumer-friendly access point to quality lawyers and legal services.

C3DE

For litigators who feel left out of the tech world, C3DE, Canada’s first 3D printing company dedicated to the courtroom, seeks to provide a different kind of visual experience and persuasion tool for trials and other court room battles. Numerous psychological, medical, behavioural and legal studies have found that the facts of a case and the merits of an argument are sometimes lost when only presented in a written or auditory format. C3DE helps solve this credibility and memory bias problem by providing lawyers, expert witnesses and paralegals with visual aids: such as 3D printing a broken spine from x-rays in order to graphically show the severity of the break; or through using a 3D PDF image to show the degeneration of a hip in a medical malpractice case. The models make it easier to explain and communicate the items at issue. They also keep the “audience” engaged.

Read More : business.financialpost.com/legal-post/spring-is-here-and-legal-tech-is-in-the-air

Bondsman in Seminole county – Transit center legal question delayed

Source    :  Candg News
By            : Terry Oparka
Category :  Bail Bondsman in Sanford, Bondsman in Seminole county

Transit center legal question delayed

There is no bus or taxi service at the Troy Multi-Modal Transit Center yet, and there likely won’t be until legal matters are settled. At issue is the amount the city will have to pay a developer for the land that the transit center sits on, which won’t be known until later this summer, at the earliest. The transit center grand opening was Oct. 15, 2014. Oakland County Circuit Judge Leo Bowman signed an order on Aug. 15, 2014, giving the city the title to the land and requiring the city to pay developer Grand/Sakwa Properties $1.05 million, based on a land appraisal.

Grand/Sakwa had donated 2.7 acres of the total 77-acre mixed-use commercial and residential property at Maple and Coolidge to the city of Troy on the condition that Troy would develop the land for use as a transportation center. The consent agreement — dated June 2, 2000 — required that the city fund the center within 10 years of the date of judgment, which the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled never happened. Last summer, Alan Greene, attorney for Grand/Sakwa, said Grand/Sakwa does not believe $1.05 million to be a proper number. He noted that the case will go on, and the dispute is now, essentially, over proper compensation. He said last week that he could not comment further on the pending litigation, but did say that Grand/Sakwa was prepared for the Aug. 24 date set for the trial.

“We were ready to go,” Greene said.

On April 20 Grand/Sakwa motioned to adjourn the trial — originally set for June 22 — in order to collect information about the number of Suburban Mobility Authority for Regional Transportation buses that would be crossing the adjacent parking lot of a shopping center developed by Grand/Sakwa. Bowman adjourned the trial until Aug. 24, which the city of Troy has asked to adjourn to another date because the appraiser who the city retained will be unavailable that day, said Troy City Attorney Lori Grigg-Bluhm.

Officials from SMART could not be reached for comment before press time. The terms of a 20-year lease agreement with Amtrak stipulate that the city perform all necessary maintenance on the center and cover operating expenses, for which Amtrak will reimburse the city 100 percent. The 2,000-square-foot transit center building has a waiting area and public restrooms, an elevator, a 90-foot pedestrian bridge from the building to the tracks, a crash wall, platform enhancements, designated parking on the Troy side, and slips for taxis and buses, although Grigg-Bluhm said that the SMART bus schedule does not include a stop at the transit center at this point. “The city is not aware of a taxi service that operates from the transit center,” Grigg-Bluhm added. The transit center is not staffed and does not have a ticket counter or kiosk, and riders must purchase tickets directly from Amtrak. The center is open for about an hour before each train departure, and police dispatch monitors video at the center 24/7. There is also a call button to directly alerts police. “I’ve heard nothing but positive feedback about the transit center since its opening,” said Troy Mayor Dane Slater.

Read More : candgnews.com/news/transit-center-legal-question-delayed-83714