The Brooklyn office of the New York State Department of Labor, on March 26. Photo: lev radin/Shutterstock

Three more law firms have given New York state labor authorities notices of layoffs or furloughs, adding to the growing number of legal-industry employees already going without paychecks as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, Levene Gouldin & Thompson and Pryor Cashman have all notified the New York Department of Labor of head count cuts in recent weeks. The notices, required under the state's Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, represented a total of 115 lost jobs.

Davidoff Hutcher, which lists 65 lawyers and five offices on its website, said it had laid off or furloughed 34 people. Levene Gouldin, which has several offices across New York's southern tier region, shed 31 jobs. And Pryor Cashman, whose furloughs of associates were previously reported, said 53 people were impacted, including lawyers and staff.

Jeffrey Citron, a co-managing partner at Davidoff Hutcher, said the firm laid off its secretarial and back-office staff, calling the move "purely preventative" and likening it to "playing defense." He said the firm hopes to rehire the employees when circumstances improve.

"It was very difficult to have the secretaries working, not being in the office," he said. While the firm's attorneys have laptops, and most of the attorneys are "computer-literate," he said, it was harder to adapt the work of support staff to the pandemic's restrictions.

Ronald Shechtman, the managing partner at Pryor Cashman, said earlier this month that work had slowed down and the firm had furloughed "some" associates. His firm, which lists more than 180 lawyers on its website, is based in Times Square and is known for its entertainment and media practices.

Asked via email whether the 53 jobs listed in the firm's WARN notice were all associates, he said "associates were a small portion of those furloughed."

All of the 53 people affected were furloughed, not laid off for the long term, he wrote, "and we furloughed support staff for whom there was not sufficient work in the context of the 'remote' workplace. We maintain their health insurance at no cost to them and intend to bring them back as soon as the workplace is 'reactivated.'"

Jeffrey Lowe, the managing partner at Levene Gouldin, said most areas at his general practice firm have seen a "significant slowdown" because of the pandemic. He said most of those laid off were law firm support staff, and he hoped the firm would be able to rehire them as soon as business picks back up, calling the situation "extremely painful."

"The whole thing is in reaction to the COVID-19 [pandemic], the [pandemic-related court] rules here in New York, and the slowdown in the work," he said.

The newest layoffs and furloughs come amid increased cost-cutting measures at law firms large and small in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its shock to the economy. The sudden shutdown of courts across the country and uncertainty around the duration of the pandemic have businesses looking to cut expenses and some law firms falling short of their revenue targets.

New York City and its suburbs have been hit harder than any other part of the country by the virus, which is highly contagious. NYC authorities said Tuesday that more than 10,000 people have likely died from the virus, even with restrictive social distancing measures that have in the past month choked off business for thousands of restaurants, retailers and other businesses.

While industries dependent on travel and foot traffic were among the first to shed jobs, the health risks and economic impacts are having a much wider impact. A group of economists surveyed by the Wall Street Journal predicted that the unemployment rate would rise to 13% by June, up from a 50-year low of just 3.5% recorded in February.

Many law firms are using pay cuts, furloughs, layoffs or a combination of measures to ride out the downturn. At some law firms, partners have forgone their monthly draws entirely. The American Lawyer has been tracking firms' announcements and reporting on the cutbacks.

The pandemic has also created uncertainty around summer associate programs. Some firms have committed to conduct the programs totally virtually, while many have shortened their duration and a smaller number have canceled the programs entirely.