Legal Updates

On June 17, 2022, the Iowa Supreme Court rendered a decision in the Borst Brothers Const. v. Finance of America case involving a mechanic’s lien, which addressed one aspect of the pre-lien notice requirement for Iowa subcontractors on residential projects. As detailed below, the Iowa Supreme Court held that the 10-day deadline for posting of a Commencement of Work Notice on the MNLR does not apply to subcontractors when they are forced to file such notice on behalf of a general contractor or owner-builder who has failed to do so.

Iowa real estate professionals are collectively breathing a sigh of relief in light of the Iowa Supreme Court’s opinion issued on June 10, 2022, in an appellate case where the Iowa Association of REALTORS® and National Association of REALTORS®, represented by attorney Jodie McDougal at Fredrikson & Byron, were granted permission to file an amicus curiae brief.

Non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) are often part of the discussions my clients have surrounding a potential construction or real estate project to protect the confidential information regarding the project and proprietary information of the parties.

Starting on June 8, 2022, Minnesotans who worked on the frontlines during the COVID-19 peacetime emergency can now apply for “Hero Pay” available through the state’s Frontline Worker Pay Program.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Minnesota’s nexus waiver policy provided that the state will not assert nexus for business income tax or for sales and use tax purposes “solely because an employee is temporarily working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Remote and hybrid work are here to stay.

The impending cessation of LIBOR has been a hot topic on the minds of borrowers and lenders alike over the last few years.

Payments fraud is nothing new, and while the scams are evolving, the core procedures for detecting and preventing them haven’t changed as much as one might think.

On May 17, Governor Reynolds signed HF 2562 into law, with much of the law being immediately effective as of May 17, 2022. Companies that own, operate and manage manufactured home communities (MHCs or MHC landlords) in Iowa need to take note of this new law, as the law contains several amendments to Iowa Code Chapter 562B relating to manufactured home communities.

Western businesses with operations in Eastern Europe and other global companies have reacted to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with shock, concern for their employees’ safety and well-being, and a scramble to comply with the raft of sanctions levied against Russia as fighting began. Likely among the lower priorities for businesses would be consideration of the environmental, social and governance (ESG) implications of the conflict. Nonetheless, Russia’s brazen military incursion does in fact raise critical considerations for the ESG programs of forward-thinking American businesses–namely the importance of the Rule of Law.