Colorado



Privacy of Biometric Identifiers and Data

Beginning July 1, 2025, the Colorado Privacy Act will include new obligations for employers collecting and using biometric data and identifiers. The Act applies to Colorado businesses that use biometric data such as an employee’s fingerprint, voice, face, retina scan, or other analysis of an individual’s physical, biological, or behavioral characteristics. Employers may only collect biometric data with mandatory advance consent from the current or prospective employee for these four narrowly defined purposes:

• Secure access to physical or digital systems
• Timekeeping (beginning and end of the workday and to record meal and rest breaks over 30 minutes)
• Workplace safety and security
• Public safety during emergencies

Employers may not require that employees consent to biometric data collection as a condition of employment, nor can an employer retaliate against an employee who does not consent.

Employers must permanently destroy biometric data at the earliest of:

• Fulfillment of the original purpose
• 24 months after the last interaction with the employee
• Receipt of a deletion request

Any entity that processes biometric identifiers must adopt a written policy that sets out a retention schedule for biometric data and provides procedures for a data breach. The entity must make its policy available to the public unless the data is only used for current employees and solely for the entity’s operation.

Prior to utilizing biometric data, an entity must clearly inform the individual that the data is being collected, the purpose for which it is being used, the retention timeframe, the name of any processor utilizing the data, and the specific reason why the biometric identifier is being shared.

To read a summary of this amendment to the Colorado Privacy Act, click here. 

Iowa



The 2026 unemployment insurance taxable wage base will decrease to $20,400 (from $39,500) and the unemployment tax rate for employers will decrease to 5.4% (from 9%). To read the state’s news release, click here.

Maine

Beginning September 23, 2025, employers with 10 or more employees for more than 120 days in a calendar year must provide those employees with “reporting time pay.” If an employee reports to work at the employer’s request, and the employer reduces the number of hours in the employee’s scheduled shift, the employer owes the employee the lesser of two hours of pay at the regular rate of pay or the total pay for the original shift. However, if the employer makes a documented good faith effort to notify the employee not to report to work, reporting time pay is not required.

Minnesota

Beginning July 1, 2025, employers may require that an employee provide documentation for paid sick leave after two consecutive days of scheduled work are missed (the previous requirement was three days).

Missouri

On July 10, 2025, Governor Mike Kehoe signed House Bill 567, which repealed the earned sick time provisions that just went into effect May 1, 2025. Employers who offered paid sick leave are no longer required to do so beginning August 29, 2025 but may continue the program if they wish.

Employees will continue to accrue one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked through August 28, 2025, and may use that leave through August 28, 2025. Beginning August 29th, paid sick leave is not mandatory, including the use of any hours accrued while the program was in place. To read FAQs about paid sick time benefits, click here.

Regarding the hours that employees will accrue between 5/1/2025 and 8/28/2025, the employer has choices. The Missouri Department of Labor and Industrial Relations (DOLIR) is expected to issue guidance for employers about how to phase out paid sick time policies. House Bill 567 did not protect accruing hours, nor did it provide any guidance on the treatment of accrued hours. Until additional guidance is issued, the options available to employers include:

• Retain and rename the MO Sick Time hours and continue to allow employees to accrue time off.
• Roll accrued hours into a new or existing PTO policy for employees to use.
• Retain accrued sick time hours and allow employees to use them within a specified time period, (i.e., by 12/31/2025 or 4/30/2026, etc.).
• Pay out remaining sick time hours to employees.
• Remove any remaining unused accrued sick time hours from employee profiles.

Please communicate with your Mize payroll processor on the option you choose for your organization. We will implement that change for payrolls that include 8/29 in the pay period. If we do not receive instructions from you by 8/28, we will stop accruing but will leave the balances available for employees to use.

For now, here are employer responsibilities:

Through August 28 Maintain Paid Sick Leave:

Continue offering paid sick leave in accordance with current requirements until the effective date of the repeal.

Review and Update Policies:

After August 28, employers should revise handbooks and internal policies to remove references to mandatory paid sick leave including removal of any applicable posters. This change does not prohibit offering paid sick leave voluntarily under a company-sponsored plan.

Nevada

Beginning October 1, 2025, minors under age 16 may only be employed as a performer in the production of a motion picture or on a farm and may not work more than 40 hours per week. Minors 16-18 years old may only work from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. on a night before a school day if they are employed as a messenger, lifeguard, employee of an arcade, stage, theatrical, or motion picture performer, or employee of a farm if the child is enrolled in school and not emancipated.

Ohio

Beginning July 21, 2025, employers may post employment notices in a digital manner accessible to employees. These include notices covering minimum wage laws, employment protections, rights for minor workers, and public employer obligations.

Washington

Beginning January 1, 2026, employers and employees may voluntarily agree to waive the requirements for a meal period for shifts of less than 8 hours. For longer shifts, the second and/or third meal periods can be waived as long as one meal period is provided during the shift.