Georgia Restrictive Covenants to be Voted On in November 2010
In April 2009, the Georgia Legislature passed a new law that will allow courts to more easily enforce agreements between employers and employees such as non-competition agreements, non-disclosure agreements, and non-solicitation agreements.
It is currently very difficult to enforce these types of agreements in Georgia, but the proposed new law (which was signed by Governor Sonny Perdue but will not become law unless the voters ratify a constitutional amendment in November 2010 election) would change that drastically.
The new statute would list guidelines to be used for enforcement of restrictive covenant, define common terms used in these employment contracts, contain specific language which will be held enforceable, and specify the types of employees that the restrictive covenant can be enforced against.
However, the most important change that the new law may bring is the ability for Georgia courts to "blue pencil" overly broad restrictive covenants so that they can enforce the parts of the restrictive covenant that are not overly broad vs. the current body of law which Georgia courts follow which forbids "blue penciling" and mandates that if a restrictive covenant is overly broad, it must be held to be un-enforceable en toto.
