SB 135

Bill Subjects

Abstract

(1) Existing law prohibits an employer with 50 or more employees in a 75-mile radius to refuse to grant an employee a request to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for family care and medical leave if the employee worked 1,250 hours in the prior 12 months. Existing law includes within "family care and medical leave" the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of a child and the serious health condition of the employee's child, parent, or spouse. This bill would expand the scope of those provisions to instead prohibit an employer with 5 or more employees to refuse to grant an employee a request to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for family care and medical leave if the employee had 180 days of service with the employer. The bill would expand the definition of "family care and medical leave" to include leave for reason of the birth or placement of a child if the employee has identified the child as their designated person, as defined, leave to care for a grandparent, grandchild, sibling, domestic partner, or designated person who has a serious health condition, and leave because of a qualifying exigency related to the covered active duty or call to covered active duty of an employee's spouse, domestic partner, child, or parent in the Armed Forces of the United States. The bill would delete a provision specifying that, if both parents are employed by the employer and are entitled to leave, the employer is not required to grant leave in connection with the birth, adoption, or foster care of a child that is greater than 12 weeks. (2) Existing law, the New Parent Leave Act, prohibits an employer with 20 or more employees in a 75-mile radius to refuse to grant an employee a request to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to bond with a new child within one year of the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of the child if the employee worked 1,250 hours in the prior 12 months. This bill would repeal those provisions. (3) Existing law establishes within the state disability insurance program a family temporary disability insurance program, also known as the Paid Family Leave program, for the provision of wage replacement benefits to workers who take time off work to care for a seriously ill family member or to bond with a minor child within one year of birth or placement, as specified, and, on and after January 1, 2021, to take time off to participate in a qualifying exigency related to the covered active duty or call to covered active duty of the individuals' spouse, domestic partner, child, or parent in the Armed Forces of the United States. This bill would expand the scope of those provisions to include time off to care for a seriously ill designated person or child-in-law, as those terms are defined, or to bond with a designated person or child-in-law within one year of the birth or placement of the designated person or child-in-law. (4) Existing law makes an individual ineligible for family temporary disability insurance benefits on any day that another family member is ready, willing, able, and available to provide the required care or participate in the qualified exigency, as specified. Existing law authorizes an employer to require an employee to take up to 2 weeks of vacation leave before the employee receives the benefits. This bill would delete those provisions. (5) Under existing law, workers are required to pay contributions to the Unemployment Compensation Disability Fund, a special fund in the State Treasury, and those funds are continuously appropriated for the purpose of providing disability benefits and making payment of administrative expenses. By authorizing the expenditure of these funds for a new purpose, the bill would make an appropriation.