Fisher Phillips COVID-19 website. (Courtesy photo)

In a sign of the times, Atlanta-based labor & employment firm Fisher & Phillips on Monday launched a task force to address an issue that didn't even exist until last week: What companies qualify for the "essential business" exemption from rapidly proliferating shelter-in-place orders?

Fisher & Phillips launched the new practice just hours before Atlanta's mayor issued a "shelter-in-place" order at midnight on Monday that effectively shut down activities by all city businesses except those deemed essential. 

Last week, San Francisco issued the first shelter-in-place order, effective March 16. About 10 states and numerous other cities made similar orders.

Roger Quillen

Roger Quillen, the national workplace law firm's chairman, said it was only last Thursday that firm lawyers considered setting up an essential business task force. "Our phones were burning up" last week, he said, with calls from worried clients asking whether they could stay open.

City and state directives on what constitutes an essential business can be confusing and vague, plus there is variation by jurisdiction, so it's an area where clients are seeking guidance, Quillen said.

"This is a practice area that didn't exist for our firm when we started asking ourselves about it on Thursday," he said. "It was a concept then, we had the task force in place on Friday, and a number of people worked all weekend."

By late Monday the new practice was up and running, with a resource center on the firm's website that tracks "shelter-in-place" orders by state and city as they are announced. (Fisher & Phillips had already revamped its website's homepage to exclusively feature its COVID-19 resources and client guidance.)

That's how fast things are happening in workplace law, Quillen said, adding that the firm has never started a new practice initiative so quickly. 

Some essential businesses are obvious across jurisdictions–for instance, health care, grocery stores, banks and telecommunication companies. But the rules are not as clear-cut for others, such as auto dealers, Quillen said.

Many car dealers have repair facilities, which are widely considered an essential business, he explained. Now that many carless urban-dwellers, such as millennials, consider public transit and rideshares too risky, there may be a rising need for car purchases—including used ones.

"We're finding that many businesses may qualify for the exempt categories because they're providing vital life services," Quillen said.

Clients initially ask what the rules are in a jurisdiction and whether their company fits the exemption, Quillen said. If it is not directly addressed, then they may want to petition an administrative agency for a broader exemption. Failing that, some are considering whether they can seek injunctive relief from a court.

Other national labor and employment firms, such as Littler Mendelson, Jackson Lewis and Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart, also have assembled extensive COVID-19 practices and offer copious online resources to assist clients. But representatives from these three firms said they hadn't started a practice area per se to address the new deluge of shelter-in-place orders.

An Ogletree representative said the firm is addressing client questions about shelter-in-place orders via its multi-disciplinary coronavirus rapid response team and online resource center.

Littler doesn't have a specific "shelter-in-place" practice, but the COVID-19 task force it started in January offers "comprehensive resources and guidance," a spokesperson said. Jackson Lewis similarly has a COVID-19 task force "to help clients decipher all of the confusing guidance coming out on a daily basis," a spokesperson said.