Arkansas Mom Sues the Government

Current Events

The following blog post is by Family Council staff member Deborah Beuerman.

Robert Longley reports the Obama administration apparently does not support a woman-owned business that helps financially-struggling parents buy children’s clothing at affordable prices.

Rhea Lana Riner of Conway founded her children’s clothing consignment sale business, Rhea Lana’s, Inc, to enable parents and other family members sell children’s clothing to other families.

“At Rhea Lana’s sales, people selling items on consignment were offered the option to volunteer to assist at the event in return for a chance to shop before the sale opens to the public. During the sales, the volunteers performed general tasks such as greeting shoppers, picking up fallen price tags, reorganizing items that shoppers have handled, and assisting shoppers with carrying items to their vehicles.”

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) says that is against the law and banned Rhea Lana’s from allowing volunteers to assist at its sales. The DOL says the volunteers were actually Rhea Lana’s “employees” under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), and as such should have been paid and are now entitled to back pay in accordance with FLSA minimum wage provisions.

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Why Isn’t Decency a Factor in School Bathroom Use?

1 CommentCurrent Events

The following blog post is by Family Council staff member Deborah Beuerman.

A lawmaker in Utah has proposed a bill that would prevent transgender students in public schools from using bathroom facilities of their choice.

The lawmaker says his plan would protect Utah schools from being forced to allow transgendered students to choose between girls’ or boys’ restrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams depending on the gender they identify themselves as having. The proposal would require schools to provide additional bathrooms for transgendered students.

A California law to allow school students to choose restrooms according to the gender they identify with took effect on January 1. There is a proposed referendum to overturn the law.

A Colorado antidiscrimination law has been applied to transgendered students and their use of school restrooms, as well.

The Maine Supreme Court has just declared that a school violated the rights of a fifth-grade transgendered student when they told him that he had to stop using the girls’ bathroom. The school had offered the use of a staff restroom to the student.

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Obama Administration Poised to Silence Political Opponents

Current Events,

The IRS is proposing new regulations giving themselves more authority to restrict nonprofit groups.

For the first time, the IRS wants to define “candidate-related political activity” to include projects such as voter guides, legislative scorecards or reporting voting records of elected officials, get-out-the-vote campaigns, promotion of voter registration, or even mentioning the names of candidates who are running for office. Any “candidate-related political activity” could jeopardize a group’s nonprofit status.

These new proposed rules are significant, because they affect organizations’ ability to engage in issue advocacy and basic political speech.

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