E-Alert Item: Family Leave: Employee Wins Half-Million-Dollar Award

Kim Pesky, a marketer for Stamford, Conn.-based Cendant Corp., took time off under state and federal family leave laws to care for her new baby. The project she was working on at the time her family leave began was purchased by another company, so the job she had left in effect no longer existed. Management offered her the choice of accepting a lesser position or taking a severance package. But she was never offered a position equivalent to her old job, although there was evidence that such positions existed. An administrative law judge for the state determined that the employer unlawfully denied the employee reinstatement, and awarded her $496,000 in damages for lost pay and benefits–one of the heftiest family leave awards ever.