New Jersey Division on Civil Rights Issues Amended Regulations on Employment Advertising

On June 23, 2014, the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights (DCR) issued amended regulations concerning employment advertisements. First, the prohibition on employment advertisements containing a preference for—or discrimination based on—certain protected characteristics (e.g., race, national origin, age, etc.), was updated to add two missing protected categories under New Jersey law: civil union status and gender identity or expression.

Second, the new regulations provide additional guidance on gender-based preferences for jobs involving intimate personal contact with persons of the opposite sex. Beyond merely showing that the position necessarily involves intimate personal contact with persons of the opposite sex, employers now must “demonstrate that such contact is an essential function of the job and a central purpose of the employer’s enterprise, that clients, patients, or others served would not consent to service by members of the opposite sex, that the legitimate privacy interests of clients, patients, or others served by the employee outweigh the public interest in equal employment opportunity, and that no reasonable alternatives to a gender-based BFOQ are feasible.”