A new city ordinance would require employers doing business in San Francisco to consider flexible scheduling for workers with caregiving responsibilities.
The city’s Board of Supervisors passed the Family Friendly Workplace Ordinance Oct. 1, and remains to be signed by the city’s mayor. It would amend the city’s administrative code to allow employees in San Francisco to request flexible or predictable working arrangements to assist with their caregiving responsibilities. The ordinance would prohibit adverse employment actions based on caregiver status and prohibits retaliation against employees for exercising their rights.
Employers would have to meet with an employee who makes a request within 21 days. They would then provide a written response to the request within another 21 days. An employer may deny a flexible or predictable scheduling request for business reasons but it must explain the reason for the denial.
The request can be made by any employee who is the primary contributor to the ongoing care of:
- a child or children for whom the employee has assumed parental responsibility;
- a person or persons with a serious health condition in a family relationship with the caregiver; or
- a parent of the caregiver age 65 or over.
The ordinance was necessary because the nation’s workforce has undergone significant changes, according to the ordinance’s “findings” section. “[A]n increased number of women in the workforce; fewer households with children that have at least one parent staying at home full-time; and more single-parent households” require flexibility from employers, it says.
Some employers already have such policies, but “even when employers offer flexible workplace arrangements, employees may not avail themselves of such arrangements for reasons such as stigma and lack of consistent consideration of such requests,” says the ordinance. The hope is that employees who seek flexible work arrangements will not “endure a ‘flexibility bias’ or ‘flexibility stigma’ in which they are discredited and devalued in the workplace.”
The ordinance would require employers to post a notice informing employees of their rights under the ordinance and to keep records of their compliance with it. If San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee (D) signs the measure into law, it will take effect Jan. 1, 2014.
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