On February 12, 2016, the Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”) promulgated the final rule on the requirement that providers and suppliers receiving funds under the Medicare program report and return overpayments by the later of sixty (60) days after the date on which the overpayment was identified…

On Wednesday, February 10, Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer (Dem.-California) introduced a draft bill with the explicit purpose to “provide short-term water supplies to drought-stricken California and provide for long-term investments in drought resiliency throughout the Western United States.”  Entitled, “California Long-Term Provisions for Water Supply and Short-Term Provisions for Emergency Drought Relief Act” (hereinafter “bill”), the 184-page bill lays out mandates for the use of funds for water projects, water infrastructure improvements and storage, emergency drought relief, and protection of listed and endangered species.

Technology and financing for water supply and re-use are also focuses of the bill. Notably, the bill supports the use of desalination and water recycling.  With regard to desalination, the bill identifies 26 desalination projects throughout California that are capable of producing more than 330,000 acre-feet of water per year.  The bill proposes adding long-term funding to support desalination projects.  In addition, the bill recognizes the need for conservation and water re-use by authorizing the expenditure of $200 million in funds for the Bureau of Reclamation’s water recycling and reuse program.  This money would be used to fund projects to reclaim and reuse wastewaters and naturally impaired ground and surface water.

Kean Miller partner Linda S. Akchin represented Graphic Packaging International in its initial trial and appeal.

Since 1948, Louisiana’s General Sales Tax Law has provided an incentive to the manufacturing industry in the form of an exclusion from tax for materials purchased for further processing into tangible personal property for sale at retail. Undoubtedly, this…

On January 29, 2016, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (“BOEM”) and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (“BSEE”), agencies within the federal Department of the Interior (“DOI”), agreed to put a temporary moratorium on issuance of fracking permits in the Pacific Outer Continental Shelf until environmental review is conducted.  The temporary moratorium is the result of a settlement agreement between the DOI and the Center for Biological Diversity (“CBD”).  CBD sued the federal agencies in February 2015, alleging violations of the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”), the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, and other federal statutes.  The litigation culminated in this settlement agreement.

The Louisiana Business Corporation Act (“LBCA”) became effective on January 1, 2015.  The changes to Louisiana corporation law embodied in the LBCA are extensive, especially in the areas of dissolution and termination of a corporation.

Simplified Termination

The LBCA allows corporations to terminate by simplified articles of termination if the corporation:  (1) does not owe…

The recent downturn in energy prices has given consumers a welcomed break at the gasoline pump. The people producing the energy, however, from landowners, to oil companies, to oil field service providers, have felt the full negative effects of the steep price decline. Those producers are seeing price pressure at every turn, reducing their net…

President Obama’s centerpiece of his climate policy agenda, the “Clean Power Plan,” has become one of the most heavily litigated environmental regulations ever. Twenty-seven states and numerous industry groups have filed more than fifteen separate lawsuits challenging the Environmental Protection Agency’s (“EPA”) statutory authority to promulgate the regulations.   Seventeen states, the District of Columbia, the…

This New Year, many employers have resolved to examine their employment relationships to determine if any joint employment relationships are lurking.   On January 20, 2016, the United States Department of Labor issued an administrator’s interpretation on joint employment and confirmed that the DOL has resolved to continue its program of pursuing issues related to joint…

On December 8, 2015 the Louisiana Supreme Court attempted to clarify the manifest error appellate review standard. Hayes Fund for the First United Methodist Church of Welsh, LLC v. Kerr McGee Rocky Mountain, LLC, 2014-2592 (La. 12/8/15); — So. 3d –, pitted plaintiff mineral royalty owners against mineral lessee and working interest owner defendants…