The Rutherford County Chamber of Commerce has sent members an email talking about newly proposed legislation that could impact local residents and businesses.

Apparently, the concern is that new legislation has the probability of negatively impacting local business owners who have already been through hard times due to a loss of revenue as the COVID-19 Pandemic continues. Most businesses have cut the hours of employees to simply remain in business. Larger companies have laid off workers to remain afloat as CEO's, managers, business owners took massive pay cuts or went without pay all together.

The email that went out on Friday stated:

Next week, the General Assembly will reconvene for a special session. The primary focus of the special session will be liability protection for businesses, schools, hospitals, essential workers, and local governments. This protection would prevent these entities from having to expend resources to defend frivolous lawsuits related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The legislation would not prevent lawsuits where an entity has not taken reasonable steps to ensure safety and has acted with gross negligence or willful misconduct."

The Chamber email closed with, "Please click the link below to contact your legislators and urge them to support this important legislation!"

The link can be found here.