Agenda - Council Work Session - 08/23/2021 - Special

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• Chris recently completed several condemnation actions for the firm's municipal clients. Other municipal attorneys at Eckberg Lammers would also be anticipated to assist the City on an as -needed or project basis. Eckberg Lammers takes a team approach to assisting our municipal clients, and other attorneys often assist on projects that are time sensitive, larger in scope, or for which a particular attorney has specialized experience. Labor & Employment Attorney Lida M. Bannink is the firm's lead Labor and Employment Attorney. Lida earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Hamline University Summa Cum Laude and received her juris doctor from the University of Wisconsin Law School. She joined Eckberg Lammers in 2015 and was admitted to the Minnesota State Bar in 2017. Lida is an early point of contact whenever municipalities and/or agencies undertake employee discipline or termination, union negotiations, unemployment insurance disputes, veterans' preference actions, grievance hearings, or other like actions. Lida is well versed in public -sector collective bargaining, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), employee discrimination complaints, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), as well as other federal and state employment laws. Lida is actively involved in bettering the community both professionally, such as her involvement in the Minnesota State Bar Association — Labor & Employment Section and the St. Croix Valley Employers' Association, and personally through various volunteer events and charitable giving opportunities. Some of Lida's larger municipal successes include: • Successfully assisted a municipality in navigating a complicated employment matter involving a unionized employee, worker's compensation, the American's with Disabilities Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, Veteran's Preference law, and discipline where the City chose to terminate said employee. This matter spanned approximately 18 months and culminated with a 4-day contested Veteran's Preference Arbitration involving expert witnesses where the City's termination decision was upheld. • Successfully assisted municipalities in understanding and navigating the complicated web of laws involving employees exhibiting mental distress including worker's compensation, PERA, FMLA, the ADA, the Veteran's Preference Law, and collective bargaining agreements. Multiple of these instances led to negotiated separation agreements. • Conducted extensive and thorough investigations of conduct to avoid legal liability and guide the City in making determinations on appropriate discipline. The highly detailed investigations assisted in assessing immediate risk and guided the client in making systemic changes to gain organizational efficiency.