HR Management & Compliance

Push for paid family leave gets boost from Washington, D.C., proposal

A bill under consideration in the Washington, D.C., City Council would give most workers in the city the most generous paid family leave allowance in the country. The bill, introduced October 5, comes amid a push by President Barack Obama and Labor Secretary Thomas Perez to encourage states and cities to adopt paid leave laws.

The bill would entitle most full- and part-time workers in the city to take up to 16 weeks of paid family leave to bond with an infant or an adopted child, recover from an illness, recuperate from a military deployment, or tend to an ill family member.

The law would be paid for by a tax on employers. That method of funding has run into opposition from the D.C. Chamber of Commerce. In a letter to the council member spearheading the bill, the chamber president and CEO said the organization cannot support the bill in part because it “attempts to give an employee a benefit in a vacuum without looking at the total benefit scheme.”

The letter also said that just three states currently have paid leave laws, and none is funded solely by employers. “The Chamber believes this bill would be unprecedented and make the District of Columbia dangerously uncompetitive at a time when the District is trying to compete for every job it can get.”

Impact of proposal

Judith Kramer, an attorney with Fortney & Scott, LLC, in Washington, D.C., and an editor of Federal Employment Law Insider, said businesses will feel the financial impact if the bill is enacted. “The proposed mandatory paid leave changes will result in the District of Columbia offering a significantly less desirable business environment because employers’ labor costs will be significantly higher in D.C.”

Kramer said that if the bill is passed and signed by the mayor, there will be a 30-day period during which Congress may review the legislation.

Terri Rhodes, CEO of the Disability Management Employer Coalition, a trade association that provides education and resources to employers about accessibility and disability compliance, said her initial reaction to the bill is favorable, and she expects it to be the beginning of a trend likely to be adopted by other cities and states.

Rhodes said she would like to see a federal law that would provide consistency instead of requiring employers to keep track of many different state and local laws. “Individual municipal laws make things very difficult for employers,” she said.

Just how various paid leave laws around the country will be integrated with the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, state family and medical leave laws, and possibly the Americans with Disabilities Act is still a question, Rhodes said.

D.C. bill details

Under the D.C. bill, workers making up to $52,000 a year would receive 100 percent of their pay while on leave, and workers making more than $52,000 a year would be paid $1,000 a week plus 50 percent of their additional pay, up to a maximum of $3,000 a week.

The bill defines covered employees as any person working in D.C. for a covered employer for 50 percent or more of the preceding year. Covered employer is defined as “any individual, partnership, general contractor, subcontractor, association, corporation, business trust, or any person or group of persons acting directly or indirectly in the interest of an employer in relation to an employee, but shall not include the United States or the District of Columbia.”

The bill would allow federal government employees who are residents of Washington, D.C., to opt into the system by paying a tax for the benefits, but federal employees living outside the city would not be eligible to opt in because under the district’s home-rule law, it isn’t permitted to tax non-D.C. residents, Kramer said.

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