Legal notice. Plant closing law covers healthcare facilities, too.
Many healthcare facilities and other not-for-profit organizations employ enough people to be covered by the new Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, which requires businesses to give 60 days' notice of a shutdown or mass layoffs. Leaders of these organizations should be aware of the law's terms. The law requires that any business enterprise that employs 100 full-time workers give 60 days' notice of a closing or mass layoffs. It also covers businesses that employ 100 or more workers, both full time and part time, who work at least a total of 4,000 hours per week. It defines employer as any "business enterprise" that employs the required number of persons. Interim interpretive rules include not-for-profit organizations in this definition, and the final rules are not likely to change this. The organization must give notice in writing to "each representative of the affected employees" or to each employee. In addition, it must notify in writing the state dislocated worker unit and the local government to which the business paid the highest taxes in the previous year. Notice is not required if it would prevent the organization from obtaining capital or business necessary to continue operations, if the shutdown is due to "natural disaster," or if the shutdown was unforeseeable. The law also allows exceptions for strikes, lockouts, and temporary jobs.
D004651:Employment; D006268:Health Facilities; D006271:Health Facility Closure; D010557:Personnel Administration, Hospital / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D013997:Time Factors; D014342:Truth Disclosure; D014481:United States