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The District of Columbia recently adopted a new version of emergency laws requiring employers to provide both paid and unpaid leave to eligible employees for certain COVID-19 related reasons. The Mayor signed the Coronavirus Support Emergency Amendment Act of 2020 and the Coronavirus Support Clarification Emergency Amendment Act of 2020 (together, CSEA) into law on…

Benefits will be available to employees under the District of Columbia’s paid family and medical leave program, known as D.C. Paid Family Leave (DCPFL), starting July 1, 2020. As discussed in our prior posts here and here, DCPFL provides partial wage replacement benefits to eligible employees who need to take leave for certain medical or family reasons. The program is funded by employer payroll taxes, which D.C. employers began paying in July 2019. DCPFL is administered by the Department of Employment Services (DOES), which will make eligibility determinations and pay benefits directly to employees.…
Continue Reading Are you ready for D.C. paid family/medical leave on July 1? Questions & Answers for employers, including benefits coordination

California food sector workers now have the right to additional paid sick leave, even if they work for large employers exempted from the federal Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). And they are also entitled to handwashing breaks every 30 minutes and additionally as needed.…
Continue Reading California grants additional paid sick leave rights to food sector workers

The Mayor of the District of Columbia recently signed two emergency laws that expand obligations of employers to provide leave to employees for COVID-19 reasons:

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) imposes new requirements – and offers off-setting tax credits – for employers with fewer than 500 employees to provide paid leave for COVID-19-related reasons, as previously explained here, here and here. That left many employers with more than 500 employees assuming they were off the hook, but if they have employees in certain California cities, that may not be the case.…
Continue Reading Larger California employers face growing local requirements to provide paid COVID-19-related sick leave and other accommodations

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA), a broad response to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, has passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 363-40 and is expected to pass in the Senate and be signed into law by President Trump. The bill would impose significant obligations on covered employers, including requiring covered employers to provide employees who have a qualifying coronavirus-related need with up to 2 weeks of paid sick leave and up to 12 weeks of FMLA leave, most of which is partially paid. Although subject to change, the most recent iteration of the bill has the following key provisions:…
Continue Reading Families First Coronavirus Response Act could mean massive changes for employers nationwide

The District of Columbia Department of Employment Services (“DOES”) recently released a Paid Family Leave Employee Notice (“PFL Notice”) that D.C. employers must provide to employees by February 1, 2020.   The PFL Notice, which is available here, contains information about the paid leave benefits that will be available under D.C.’s Universal Paid Leave Amendment…

On August 9, 2019, the D.C. Office of Employment Services (DOES) took another step toward full implementation of D.C.’s Universal Paid Leave Amendment Act of 2016 (UPLA) by issuing proposed benefits regulations. In a recent post, we discussed generally the paid leave benefits eligible employees can receive from DOES under UPLA starting July…

Under the District of Columbia’s Universal Paid Leave Amendment Act of 2016 (UPLA), paid family and medical leave will soon be a reality in DC.  The DC paid leave program will be funded entirely by employer payroll tax contributions. [1]  The first tax contributions from employers are due July 31, 2019 (unless that deadline is…

Many employers offer paid parental leave policies to employees, affording new parents paid time off to care for a new child. Though some employers offer paid parental leave to both new mothers and fathers of equal length, many others offer substantially longer leaves to primary caregivers. Bifurcated parental leave policies for primary and non-primary caregivers…