Our Practice

Fenway Law can provide fact-finding and independent investigation services for your workplace, in any industry.

On campus, we use our extensive experience in K-12 and higher education to take a professional approach to each matter. 

We treat all individuals with the respect and dignity they deserve, including students, staff, faculty, administrators and caregivers.

Federal Title IX regulations require educational institutions to maintain policies, practices, and programs that do not discriminate against anyone based on sex. 

Fenway Law can assist your institution with developing policies and processes that meet the demands of the evolving Title IX compliance and regulatory landscape. 

We also help institutions process Title IX and related policy claims through our investigatory services, or as hearing officer, hearing panel member, or party advisor.  We value and support restorative justice practices when all parties can agree to an alternative to formal proceedings.

We approach each matter with careful discretion, mutual respect and shared trust, sensitive to the long-lasting effects that these claims can have for all involved.

With nearly two decades of experience representing employers in government and education, Fenway Law can advise your organization on union relations and collective bargaining issues, including contract development and interpretation, dispute resolution and training for managers and supervisors.

Respected on both sides of the table for a fair and principled approach to labor-management relations, let Fenway Law help create mutual gains  for your organization and your employees.  We have negotiated dozens of agreements with labor organizations representing faculty, teachers, clerical and technical staff, public safety and trades and construction workers (including Project Labor Agreements with the area building trades). 

Along the way, we have resolved dozens of conflicts through settlement - with or without facilitation.  We can help assure your workplace operations remain productive through development and maintenance of a relationship founded on mutual respect and shared outcomes.

With changing laws and regulations in human resources and leave benefits at the state and federal level, Fenway Law can assist companies with decoding operational requirements under federal overtime regulations, implementation of paid family and medical leave, new holidays and increased minimum wages in Massachusetts, and assure that basic workplace policies remain up to date.

Clear writing and effective training are the keys to successful implementation of any new policy or compliance measure.  Let Fenway Law assist you in preparing your organization for the modern workplace.  Recent work includes: 

• Compliance solutions for independent contractors
• Non-profit institutional guidance for whistleblowers
• Leave and time off for new parents, nursing mothers and victims of domestic violence
• Guidelines for employee use of social media

Experienced as general counsel for a small college, our Founding Principal built an in-house legal office by promoting clear institutional policies and stable practices, from admissions to student affairs, human resources, finance, facilities and academics.  With prior experience as a policy, compliance and labor and relations leader for a large, decentralized university, let Fenway Law fill your short-term general needs or craft ad hoc practical solutions for your enterprise needs in human resources, operations and risk management.  Some recent successes:

• Assured compliant policies and remote systems for employees, classrooms, counseling, health services and student conduct during COVID-19
• Implemented Massachusetts Department of Higher Education's FARM regulatory reporting obligations 
• Resolved a complaint using facilitated resolution with the US Department of Education Office of Civil Rights (OCR) 
• Led operational process improvements for contract management, incident response, record retention, Emotional Support Animals, and campus safety
• Drafted and negotiated multiple articulation agreements with peer institutions, and clinical and field placement agreements for nursing and education programs
• Enterprise data privacy policies (WISP, DMCA, GDPR)
• Designed and implemented a process to promote child safety in campus programs at multiple institutions
• Staffed critical diversity and inclusion initiatives to review the cultural relevance of an institutional mascot, and implemented institutional transgender rights

Respectful dialogue between parties can often resolve differences without the need for litigation.  Fenway Law can act as a neutral to assist parties, that may or may not be represented by their own legal counsel, to facilitate the resolution of a claim in a rules-based setting.

Mediation

Fenway Law can facilitate a discussion between parties to resolve a claim.  Mediation is an efficient, flexible and cost-effective alternative to litigation, providing the parties with a confidential and non-binding method to achieve a written resolution.

Most cases brought to mediation move to resolution, because often the parties that agree to speak have taken the most important first step in settling a claim. 

Arbitration 

Fenway Law can act as a neutral and independent decision maker that issues a binding and written decision after hearing presentations from each party.  Arbitration hearings are a less formal alternative to a court or administrative proceeding, with the arbitrator as the hearing officer.  Like mediation, arbitration is often quick and cost-effective, and is available for collective bargaining disputes between employers and employee unions, or between employers and non-represented employees. 

Michael Loconto is a private labor arbitration panel member in New England. We are available to travel to the litigants, or to host the parties at a neutral site.

From startups in Series funding to mature companies in the tech industry, we can help leaders to think through critical human resources policies and other needs that are key to a sustainable and modern workforce. 

Our two decades of leadership in local government and education services enable timely business development advice for pre-seed companies in EdTech and GovTech.

Organizations and individuals often engage with regulators to discuss development, and seek greater understanding, of the laws, policies, regulations and ordinances affecting their operations.

With expertise in labor and education policy, let Fenway Law assist you or your organization to be heard by government agencies on issues important to your work.