Kristina M.Launey

Partner

Labor & Employment

klauney@seyfarth.com

Sacramento

+1 (916) 498-7034

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Kristina provides clients collaborative, strategic, effective employment and disability access solutions and litigation defense, which minimize risk and keep in mind the business goals and realities.

More About Kristina

Civil rights and nondiscrimination laws, especially those protecting individuals with disabilities, are often complex and individualized in their application. This poses compliance and litigation defense challenges for businesses. To navigate sticky disability discrimination compliance matters, employers and public accommodations turn to Kristina for practical, efficient, and effective compliance solutions and litigation strategy.

Kristina began her employment practice more than 15 years ago at the California Legislative Counsel's Office, providing advice on the drafting and application of employment and other laws to the Legislature and businesses. She brings her understanding of how the laws are made, their history, and interpretation to help clients find solutions that comply with the law in light of their business realities and employee workforce needs.

Kristina has a unique depth and breadth of experience in counseling and defending businesses in disability access matters brought under Title III of the ADA and related laws, gained through fifteen years of counseling, litigation, studying legal developments, and participation in site inspections and demonstrations by disabled claimants, plaintiffs, attorneys, and professionals. This has given her a deep understanding of application of disability access physical facilities standards, effective communication, modifications to policies and practices, as well as cutting-edge accessibility issues, such as those associated with emerging technologies, the practical impact on individuals with disabilities, and real challenges business face in compliance with unclear and changing legal requirements. Kristina and the other attorneys members of Seyfarth's nationwide ADA Title III specialty team stay on top of emerging developments in disability access laws, on the pulse of litigation trends, and provide us with unique depth of experience and knowledge of the plaintiffs' attorneys, advocates, and consultants in the disability access field. This gives Kristina and the entire ADA Title III team unique insights, strategies, and collaborations, facilitating the most effective, efficient representation for clients.

Kristina is always looking for more efficient ways to serve clients, such as through connecting clients with her colleagues with unique talents, innovative tools, and processes Seyfarth offers. She has a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, and uses the program's ways of thinking, brainstorming, and process tools in her everyday practice. Kristina has also created customized charts and other tools to provide clients updates on all active matters on a schedule that meets their needs. She once worked with SeyfarthLean Consulting to create a Seyfarth Link platform to help it track matters and data points required to be reported under an agency consent decree. Additionally, she often engages in novel dispute resolution mechanisms, such as structured negotiations, to minimize cost and disruption to clients, and usually attempts to resolve legal matters collaboratively before incurring the substantial expense and distraction of litigation.

Kristina enjoys partnering with clients to help solve their business compliance and litigation matters, as well as exploring any opportunities these otherwise problematic issues may present. She is honored to work with such a talented group of attorneys throughout Seyfarth in California and all of the domestic and international offices. In Kristina's words, "I never cease to be impressed by the commitment to client service and excellence every one of our attorneys shares, as well as to being engaged with their communities and providing pro bono legal representation."

  • JD, University of California Davis School of Law
  • BA, University of California, Berkeley
    Political Economy of Industrial Societies; Spanish minor
  • California
  • US Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
  • US District Court, Central District of California
  • US District Court, Eastern District of California
  • US District Court, Northern District of California
  • US District Court, Southern District of California

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