There’s been a good amount of talk recently about the “Balancing Act of 2009”, a bill proposed by Democrat Lynn Woolsey that seems to have a strong chance of passing.
This bill incorporates portions of the Family Leave Insurance Act allowing eligible employees 12 weeks of paid leave over a 12 month period for the following purposes among others:
- To care for their own illness
- To care for a sick family member or new child
- To place a child up for adoption or foster care
- To address a “qualifying exigency” arising from a family member’s call to active duty
- To care for a relative who is a wounded veteran
If the “Balancing Act” becomes a law, employers in all 50 states would need to know about quite a few significant FMLA-related changes.
A few noteworthy ones are as follows:
- The terms of FMLA coverage for “family wellness” related leave (as outlined in the Family and Medical Leave Enhancement Act) would be extended to employers with 25+ employees from the original 50+ employees.
- Borrowing from the Healthy Families Act eligible employees at companies with 15 or more employees will earn one hour of paid six leave per-30 hours worked (not to exceed 56 hours, or 7 days, per-year).
- Eligibility for the paid leave covered under the Balancing Act would be extended to certain part-time and temporary employees not previously included. It would be extended to include employees working 1,050 hours or more in a given calendar year (up from employees working 1,250 hours or more in a given calendar year).
How will employees’ 12 week paid leaves be funded?
Under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), The U.S. Department of Labor would manage a joint fund between employer and employee and 0.2% of employee earnings would be put towards the fund
UBP blog 