Maine Sexual Harassment Training Requirements for Employers

Maine sexual harassment training requirements come from Title 26, Section 807 of the Maine Revised Statutes. Every employer in the state, regardless of size, must display a workplace poster and send each employee an individual written notice at least once a year. Employers with 15 or more employees have an added duty: formal training for every new hire within one year of their start date, plus additional training for anyone in a supervisory or managerial role. Fines run from $1,000 for a first notice or training violation up to $5,000 for repeat offenses.¹

What Every Maine Employer Owes, Regardless of Size

Two obligations apply to every employer in Maine from the first hire forward.

The first is the workplace poster. It must sit in a prominent, accessible location and cover the illegality of sexual harassment, a description with examples, how to file a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission, and the commission’s contact information. The statute caps the reading level at sixth grade.¹

The second is the annual written notice, covered in its own section below. Both apply even if you have only a handful of workers. The formal training mandate is separate and only engages at 15 or more employees.

The Annual Written Notice

This is the piece employers most often miss, because they assume a training session covers it. It doesn’t. Every employee must receive an individual written notice, every year, that covers:

The illegality of sexual harassment
The definition of sexual harassment under Maine law
A description with concrete examples
The internal complaint process available at work
The external complaint process through the Maine Human Rights Commission
Contact information for the commission
Protection against retaliation for anyone who reports harassment

The notice must reach every employee without exception. The statute suggests delivering it alongside a paycheck as a way to ensure universal distribution.¹

Training for New Employees at 15+ Employers

Once an employer reaches 15 employees, every new hire must complete an education and training program within one year of their start date. The program has to go beyond a general overview of company policy. Maine law prescribes the topics it must cover:¹

A clear statement that sexual harassment violates the law
The definition of sexual harassment under both the Maine Human Rights Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Examples of prohibited conduct
The internal complaint process, including who to report to and how investigations are handled
How to file an external complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission
Contact information for the commission
Retaliation protections, including that reporting cannot legally result in job loss, demotion, or other punishment

The requirement to cover both state and federal definitions matters. Many off-the-shelf programs focus on one or the other. Under federal law, harassment becomes unlawful when it is severe or pervasive enough that a reasonable person would find the work environment intimidating, hostile, or abusive; isolated minor incidents generally don’t meet that federal threshold.² Your program needs to reach both standards.

The one-year window gives you scheduling flexibility, but waiting until month eleven is a gamble. If the employee leaves before completing training, or a complaint surfaces during the gap, your compliance posture is much harder to defend.

Extra Training for Supervisors and Managers

Anyone stepping into a supervisory or managerial role must receive additional training on top of what rank-and-file employees get. The deadline is the same: within one year of starting the supervisory duties. The extra curriculum focuses on two things — the specific responsibilities that come with authority, and the methods supervisors must use to take immediate and appropriate corrective action when they receive a complaint or witness harassment firsthand.¹

This is where most organizational liability actually sits. A front-line employee who harasses a coworker creates one set of problems. A manager who knows and does nothing creates a much bigger one. The statute does not set a separate recurring training schedule for supervisors already in place; the trigger is commencement of supervisory duties. Still, an employer who trains a manager once and never revisits the topic is exposed, particularly when policy or law changes.

Recordkeeping and the Required Checklist

The Maine Department of Labor develops an official compliance checklist that employers must use when building their training program. Using this checklist is not optional guidance; the statute requires it. The checklist is published on the department’s website, and the Maine Human Rights Commission links to it as well.¹

You must also keep a record of every training session and track which employees have completed the program. Records must be maintained for at least three years and made available for department inspection on request.¹

Good records are the first line of defense when a complaint surfaces. A log showing the accused employee completed training on a specific date, covering specific topics, demonstrates reasonable preventive steps. Digital or physical format is fine; what matters is that someone can produce the records the same day an inspector or attorney asks.

Employees who want to file externally have 300 days from the date of the discriminatory act to bring a complaint to the Maine Human Rights Commission, and your training must explain that route so employees know they have an option beyond the internal process.³

Penalties for Noncompliance

Section 807 sets two separate penalty schedules. Poster violations carry daily fines; notice and training violations carry flat penalties per occurrence.¹

Workplace Poster Violations

First violation: up to $25 per day, capped at $1,000
Second violation within three years of a prior violation: $25 to $50 per day, capped at $2,500
Third or subsequent violation within three years of two or more prior violations: $25 to $100 per day, capped at $5,000

Notice and Training Violations

First violation: $1,000
Second violation: $2,500
Third or subsequent violation: $5,000

The department enforces through inspections and in response to complaints. The three-year lookback on poster violations means a second lapse inside that window lands automatically in a higher tier.

Counting Remote and Out-of-State Employees

Section 807’s text focuses on workplaces with 15 or more employees without defining whether that count includes workers physically located elsewhere. If you have a mix of in-state and remote staff, err on the side of inclusion when tallying toward the threshold, and treat this as a question worth running past an employment attorney rather than guessing.

The picture gets more complex for Maine-based employers with workers in other states. California, New York, Illinois, and Delaware each have their own mandatory harassment training laws with different rules on frequency, content, and coverage. A Maine employer with a remote employee in New York, for example, has to satisfy both Maine’s content requirements and New York’s annual interactive training mandate. Tracking where remote employees actually sit is an ongoing compliance task, not a one-time exercise.

1
Maine State Legislature. Maine Code 26 – Requirements
2
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Harassment
3
Maine Human Rights Commission. File a Complaint