How to Protect Yourself and Your Guests When you Host a Holiday Party
Parties are a wonderful way to celebrate the holidays. If you are going to host a party this season, there are steps you can take to protect yourself and your guests.
1. You may be held liable if intoxicated guests leave your party and cause injury or property damage so take steps to keep them and the public safe.
- Encourage guests to pick a designated driver.
- Stock plenty of non-alcoholic beverages and serve food.
- Don’t pressure guests to drink.
- Cut off guests who have had too much to drink.
- Call a cab for intoxicated guests. If you are sober, drive them home or offer them a place to sleep at your house.
- Never allow minors to drink.
- Stay in control by not drinking too much yourself.
2. Protect your guests from unsafe conditions on your property.
- Fix tripping hazards like broken stairs or loose handrails. Double-stick tape throw rugs and secure extension cords.
- Remove any dangerous items that might injure children.
- In colder climates, clear sidewalks and steps of ice and snow.
- If you have a pool, keep gates locked or make sure kids are supervised by an adult if they use the pool.
- Consider restraining pets.
3. Review your homeowner’s insurance before the party.
- Make sure it is in force and that your policy limits are high enough to cover an injury. Standard minimums of $100,000 to $300,000 may not be enough to cover all the costs associated with a serious injury.
- If you have significant assets in addition to your home, consider an umbrella policy for added liability protection.
- Check for exclusions and contact your agent if you have any questions.
You can read more tips and find useful links on how to host a safe party at http://letamericaknow.com/view_newsletter_ysk.php?memberid=22515&orderid=872&newsletterid=294&issueid=1511&subscriberid=749173
If you have been involved in an Arizona motor vehicle accident, we’re here to help. Khalidi Law Firm, PLLC has more than two decades’ experience litigating vehicle accidents, including cars, motorcycles, trucks and even bicycles from our offices in Tucson’s Barrio Historica.
Road Closures and Bike Routes for Tomorrow’s Tour de Tucson
More than 9,000 bicyclists will take part in tomorrow’s 2015 El Tour de Tucson. The annual event brings many benefits to our community and multiple non-profit organizations, however, drivers will need to be aware of the cyclists and plan for traffic delays.
Drivers should look for rolling traffic closures and heavy delays along the routes from 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Plan for a lot of extra travel time and be aware of pedestrians and bicyclists.
The 104 mile race will kick off at 7 a.m. at Armory Park at 221 S. 6th Avenue. All races will finish at Armory Park around 5 p.m.
- The 75 mile race starts at 8:30 a.m. at Pima Community College East Campus, located on Irvington Road.
- The 55 mile race starts at 10:30 a.m. at the intersection of Swan Road and Fort Lowell Road.
- The 40 mile race starts at 2090 E. Innovation Park Drive, near Oracle Road in Oro Valley.
The event will force the following highway closures:
- I-10 & Silverlake Road closes from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m.
- I-10 & Starr Pass Boulevard from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.
- I-10 & Wilmot Road from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m.
- I-10 & Craycroft Road from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m.
- I-10 & Kolb Road from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.
- Eastbound I-10 at Congress Street, 22nd Street and Kolb Road from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.
In addition, the following roads will be closed in Downtown Tucson from 2 a.m. to 6 p.m.:
- 6th Avenue between Broadway Boulevard and 22nd Street
- 6th Avenue and 12th Street
- 6th Avenue and 13th Street
- 5th Avenue and 12th Street
- 5th Avenue and 13th Street
- Arizona Avenue at 12th and 13th Street
- 22nd Street from 6th Avenue to the westbound I-10 frontage lanes
See the link below for detailed course routes:
http://www.perimeterbicycling.com/el-tour-de-tucson/files/2011/08/2015-ETT-Route-MapColor-10-30.pdf
Sign a Contract and Lose Your Right to Seek Justice in Court
Consumer beware. American corporations have created a private system to settle disputes that denies consumers their day in court.
When you sign a contract to buy a cell phone, rent a car, join a bank, put your loved one in a nursing home, sign an employment contract, make an investment, or are admitted to the hospital buried in the fine print may be a forced-arbitration clause. In the event of a dispute with the company, under forced-arbitration a consumer or an employee cannot take their case to court. Also, consumers cannot band together to form a class action to bring about a change in business practices. Instead, consumers are funneled into a rigged system decided by an arbitration company chosen by the company.
How You Are Hurt By The Fine Print:
- One-sided Requirements – Consumers waive their rights to sue but corporations do not.
- High Costs – Consumers often must pay steep filing fees to initiate a case as well as pay their share of the arbitrator’s hourly charges. In addition, forced-arbitration clauses often allow the corporation to choose the arbitrator, as well as the location, regardless of how inconvenient or costly travel will be for the consumer.
- Biased Decision-Makers – There is a disincentive for an arbitrator to rule in favor of a consumer if he hopes to be hired by the business again. The arbitrator is not required to have any legal training or even follow the law when reaching a decision.
- Weak Civil Justice Safeguards – The individual’s ability to argue his or her side of the case is often restricted, including access to necessary evidence. The arbitrator’s decision is almost impossible to appeal.
- Secret Backroom Proceedings – While proceedings and records of the courts are open to the public, most forced-arbitration clauses require that proceedings be kept confidential, even if the case raises important public health and safety issues.
Last week, The New York Times published an investigative series exposing the corporate bullying tactic of forced-arbitration. The stories are based on thousands of court records, interviews with lawyers, judges, arbitrators, and the people who have been affected by forced arbitration, in 35 states.
Most people interviewed by the Times did not know they had signed away their rights to sue. The family of a 94-year-old woman at a nursing home who died from a festering head wound found that they could not sue the nursing home. Parents of an infant who was born with serious deformities could not sue the obstetrician for negligence. Students who received a worthless degree could not file a class action suit against the for-profit university.
The first story “Arbitration Everywhere, Stacking the Decks of Justice” describes the pernicious practice of forced arbitration, a get-out-of-jail free card for corporate wrongdoing.
The second story, “In Arbitration, a Privatization of the Justice System” tells stories of consumers who lost their right to go to court when a school, a car dealership, and even a nursing home had done them wrong.
The third and final story “In Religious Arbitration, Scripture is the Rule of Law” focuses on how religious tribunals, once used to settle family disputes and spiritual debates, are now being used to sort out secular problems like claims of financial fraud and wrongful death.
The article’s investigative reporter, Jessica Silver-Greenberg, elaborated on the series during an interview on Fresh Air. You can hear her interview at http://www.npr.org/2015/11/12/455749456/have-we-lost-a-constitutional-right-in-the-fine-print
Unless we speak up, Congress is unlikely to come to the aid of consumers and empolyees. Contact your Congressmen and demand they act to protect your right to have your day in court. Don’t wait until you need your rights to find out you don’t have them.
Proposed Federal Rule Would Allow Nursing Home Residents to Have Their Day in Court
When moving into a nursing home, patients are given a slew of paperwork to sign as precondition to admission. Most patients don’t know the documents often include a mandatory arbitration clause. By signing these documents, they’ve “agreed” to the mandatory arbitration clause. If the resident is injured or killed by the negligence of the nursing facility or its staff, the facility will then argue that the patient and their family gave up their constitutional right to a jury trial.
Arbitration typically favors the nursing home industry over the patient. For example, a 2009 study revealed that, if an arbitrator does find in favor of the patient, arbitrators allow money damages that are 35% less than juries for similar injuries.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has proposed regulations requiring nursing homes to explain arbitration agreements to ensure that residents and their families understand what they’re signing. Equally importantly, the regulation would prohibit conditioning admission on agreeing to mandatory arbitration.
We believe this does not go far enough. More than 50 labor, legal, medical and consumer organizations want the government ban these pre-dispute arbitration agreements entirely. Former US Congressman Henry Waxman joins 34 US senators and attorney generals from 15 states and the District of Columbia calling for a total ban of the mandatory arbitration clauses.
To learn more about this proposed rule to protect the elderly and their families, go to npr.org at http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/10/19/449957318/suing-a-nursing-home-could-get-easier-under-proposed-federal-rules
Keeping the Elderly Safe at Home
According to the AARP, nearly 90 percent of people over age 65 want to stay in their own home as long as possible.
As we age, our vision, hearing, and reaction times diminish, therefore, it is very important to make our homes more senior-friendly after we reach retirement age. It is especially important to prevent falls, as they are the leading cause of injuries for older Americans.
The most recent edition of the online newsletter, You Should Know, features articles, links, and safety tips for making a home safer for elderly family members and friends.
Here are 5 tips for safely “aging in place”:
1. Keep a List of Emergency Numbers by Each Phone. Include numbers for the poison control center, fire and police departments, family members, and doctor. Write the numbers big enough to read easily if in a hurry or frightened.
2. Prevent Falls. Keep all hallways, stairs, and paths well-lit and clear of objects. Remove area rugs. Tape cords to the floor so they don’t move. Use railings and banisters when taking the stairs. If possible, add railings to both sides of the stairways and improve stairwell lighting.
3. Protect Against Fire and Related Dangers. Try to only smoke outside. Never smoke in bed or near oxygen. Install a loud smoke alarm on every level of the house, in bedrooms, and outside of sleeping areas. Test smoke alarms once a month.
4. Eliminate Bathroom Hazards. Bathrooms account for 80 percent of all falls. Install grab bars in the shower and near the toilet. Use a shower seat and put rubber mats in the bathtub or shower. Set the water heater thermostat no higher than 120 F to prevent scalding. Make sure there is a lit path to the bathroom.
5. Prevent Poisoning. Keep all medications in their original containers. Store them in a well-lit room so the labels are easy to read. Ask the pharmacy to put large-print labels on prescription bottles. Bring all pill bottles to doctor appointments to ensure medications are being taken correctly.
For links to videos and articles on how to prevent falls, how to make a bathroom safer, and other home safety tips for older adults, access the newsletter at this link: http://letamericaknow.com/view_newsletter_ysk.php?memberid=22515&orderid=872&newsletterid=290&issueid=1510&subscriberid=749173
Its Time to get a Flu Shot
In the U.S., flu season runs from October to May, peaking between December and February. Its too early for the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to predict the severity of the 2015-2016 flu season.
A yearly flu vaccine is recommended for everyone 6 months and older. It takes about two weeks after vaccination for antibodies to develop in the body and provide protection against the flu – so now is the time to get your shot.
Vaccination is especially important for protecting those at high risk for serious flu complications, including:
• young children
• pregnant women
• adults 65 years and older
• anyone with chronic health conditions like asthma, diabetes, and heart disease.
Flu shots are offered by many doctor’s offices, walk-in clinics, health departments, pharmacies, and college health centers.
The CDC’s HealthMap Vaccine Finder uses a zip code to find local facilities that offer vaccines.
To access the site visit please visit: http://flushot.healthmap.org/
How to Protect Your Home from a Buffelgrass Fire
The Sonoran Desert is being transformed into a flammable grassland by buffelgrass, an African grass that was brought to the U.S. for cattle feed and erosion control.
When dry, buffelgrass is extremely dangerous. It is highly flammable and burns nearly twice as hot as other grasses, with temperatures approaching 1600°C. (Hot enough to melt most metals.)
Buffelgrass has spread throughout the Tucson Valley. You can see it growing along roadsides, around homes and businesses, and in washes, vacant lots, alleyways, and parks.
There are two ways you can eradicate buffelgrass to protect your home and property. You can spray the plants with an herbicide or pull them out by hand.
If 50% or more of the plant is green (like in the photo above), herbicides can be used. If less than 50% of the plant is green, manual removal is the best method. It is easiest to pull buffelgrass after the soil has been soaked by rain.
Herbicide:
- Plants must be green and actively growing for herbicides to be effective; this can happen anytime between February and November when rains are good.
- Spray the plants with glyphosate (the active ingredient in Roundup®). Follow the label directions. For very green plants a 2% solution works well. As the plants dry, higher concentrations may be more effective.
- Spray enough chemical on the plants to coat all the leaves, but not so much that it runs off.
- Add a dye to the chemical solution to help avoid spraying non-target species and ensure you do not miss plants or spray them twice.
Pulling by Hand:
- Mowing is not an effective control method.
- Always check for snakes before reaching into the grass to remove it from the soil.
- Use a digging tool (caliche bar, digging bar, or rock pick) to loosen the plant from the soil, enough so that it can be pulled out without leaving roots behind. If any part of the root ball is left in the ground it will re-sprout.
- Wedge the soil bar point into soil at the base of the plant at an angle. Push down on the soil bar to lever the plant out of the ground. A rock can be used as a fulcrum to provide more leverage.
- Place the pulled plants into heavy-duty trash bags and dispose of them in your garbage can.
Fire safety experts recommend surrounding your home and other structures with a 50-foot defensible space that is free of buffelgrass and other flammable materials. Because buffelgrass is so hardy and the seeds can stay dormant for years, you will need to continuously monitor your property for re-sprouting plants or new infestations.
Visit http://www.buffelgrass.org to learn more about buffelgrass and report your removal efforts.
People Who Make a Difference
Check out You Should Know, our monthly electronic newsletter that covers a wide range of timely topics of interest, including safety, health, and legal tips.
This month’s issue shares stories of injured people and their families who decided to make a difference in protecting the health, safety, and legal rights of others.
One hero profiled this month is Amy Van Dyken, an American swimmer (seen in the photo above) who won six gold medals in the Olympics. In 2014, Amy was paralyzed from the waist down when she fell off her ATV. Drawing on the strength and will power that makes her an Olympic champion, Amy launched the Amy Van Dyken Foundation to raise money and awareness for people with spinal cord injuries who cannot afford badly needed medical equipment.
If you are not on our mailing list and wish to read the August issue of You Should Know, click on this link: http://letamericaknow.com/view_newsletter_ysk.php?memberid=22515&orderid=872&newsletterid=278&issueid=1508&subscriberid=0
If you would like to receive monthly issues of the You Should Know e-newsletter, please contact vkhalidi@tnklaw.com.
Is Your ATM Safe to Use?
When you need cash, do you use an ATM to withdraw money from your bank account?
If you do, and you don’t pay attention before you insert your card into the slot, you’re at risk for “skimming”, a technique used by thieves to steal account information to create fake debit cards.
A thief typically uses putty to attach a “skimmer” over the ATM’s card reader to scan and store the information from the card’s magnetic strip. The skimmer is typically no bigger than a deck of cards and often blends in with the machine. The photo on the right shows an ATM with a skimmer in place. The photo on the left shows an untampered ATM card reader.
The thief needs the PIN number to access the bank account. To get it, he uses a fake keyboard or hides a tiny camera with a clear view of the keypad to record the user’s keystrokes.
Here are some simple steps you can take before inserting your card that can help protect your bank account from ATM skimming:
- Make sure the ATM doesn’t have any nuts or bolts out of place.
- Take a moment to scrutinize the card reader. Make sure it’s the same color as the rest of the machine. Make sure it’s not loose.
- Look for any wires or off-color pieces of plastic on or near the ATM that could indicate a hidden camera. Cameras have been found hidden in brochure racks.
- Scrutinize the keypad before typing in your PIN. If the keypad protrudes from the surface around it, or if it is a different shade or color than the rest of the ATM, it may be fake.
- Always cover the keypad with your hand when entering your PIN.
Card skimmers have also been found on self-service pumps at gas stations. Use similar precautions when using your card at the pump.
To learn more about to spot an ATM skimming device go to http://www.tucsonnewsnow.com/story/29264764/how-to-spot-atm-skimming-devices
FDA Issues Stronger Warnings for Common Over-the-Counter Medications
Most people assume that if a medication is available without a prescription, it’s safe. But any drug, over-the-counter or not, can have serious side effects.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently issued stronger warnings for some very common nonprescription non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory medications, including Advil, Celebrex, Aleve and Motrin IB.
These and other anti-inflammatories, even when taken as directed, increase the risk of heart attack and stroke by increasing blood clotting, blood pressure, and hardening of the arteries.
Both short-term and long-term users of the drugs are effected, but the level of risk depends on the consumer’s existing risk for heart disease or stroke.
For individuals who require these drugs to function, doctors recommend taking lowest dose possible and being attentive to the signs of heart disease and stroke such as chest discomfort, short-windedness, or a loss of motor power or sensory power.
Non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory medications are powerful drugs and carry serious health risks. If your pain is mild or moderate, it may be wise to consider non-drug alternatives.
The FDA did not issue stronger warnings for aspirin or Tylenol (generic acetaminophen).
You can learn learn more about the strengthened FDA warnings and the risks from non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory medications on this Diane Rehm broadcast: https://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2015-07-16/health-risks-associated-with-some-over-the-counter-pain-medications