Mandatory Sick Leave

This week, the California Assembly Labor and Employment Committee approved AB 1522, a bill sponsored by Lorena Gonzales; D-San Diego,  that would require all California employers, except those with collective bargaining agreements, to provide their employees who have worked in California for seven days, with mandatory sick leave.  The sick leave has a proposed accrual rate of one hour for every 30 hours worked, which Gonzales claims would provide the employee with 3 sick days in each calendar year.  The bill is being classified at a “Jobs Killer Bill” by organizations like CalChamber.

The bill’s summary states as follows:

This bill would enact the Healthy Workplaces, Healthy Families Act of 2014 to provide that an employee who works in California for 7 or more days in a calendar year is entitled to paid sick days, to be accrued at a rate of no less than one hour for every 30 hours worked. An employee would be entitled to use accrued sick days beginning on the 90th calendar day of employment. The bill would authorize an employer to limit an employee’s use of paid sick days to 24 hours or 3 days in each calendar year. The bill would require an employer to provide paid sick days, upon the request of the employee, for diagnosis, care, or treatment of health conditions of the employee or an employee’s family member, or for leave related to domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking. The bill would prohibit an employer from discriminating or retaliating against an employee who requests paid sick days. The bill would require employers to satisfy specified posting and notice and record keeping requirements. The bill would define terms for those purposes and make conforming changes.