by Marti Cardi, Esq. - Senior Compliance Consultant and Legal Counsel
& Gail Cohen, Esq. - Assistant General Counsel, Employment and Litigation
March 12, 2018
The New York state legislature introduced a bill proposing to expand the coverage of paid leave. See NY S 7723. As with so much of the NY PFL law and regulations, the proposed bill – if enacted as is – will add more complications and conflicts. Here’s what is in the bill: 
PROVISION | COMMENTS – IF PASSED |
| Adds as a covered leave reason, matters related to being victim of domestic or sexual violence: Medical attention, attending counseling sessions, seeking legal assistance, attendance in court proceedings, communicating with an attorney, relocating to a permanent or temporary residence. | This leave will create a category under Paid Family Leave for which the employee can obtain paid leave for personal medical needs. An employee’s own medical condition is otherwise excluded from PFL coverage due to the availability of disability leave insurance |
| Available only for employee as victim, not for a family member as a victim. | Almost all existing laws granting leaves for victims of domestic violence and similar crimes provide time off if either the employee or a specified family member is the victim. The limitation to the employee only is unusual and we might expect to see an amendment in this regard.
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| Employee can use only 2 weeks of paid PFL (out of the 8, 10, or 12 weeks of total PFL entitlement) for the new leave reason, but can also use 2 additional weeks unpaid, and the unpaid weeks have the same PFL protections. | The bill provides an employee with 2 additional weeks of leave for matters related to domestic violence (but unpaid). For example, in 2018 an employee could take 6 paid weeks to care for a family member, 2 paid weeks for matters relating to being a victim of domestic violence, and 2 weeks unpaid for the same – a total of 10 job-protected weeks off, although for all other reasons NY PFL is limited to 8 weeks in 2018. |
| Benefits are paid at 67% of employee’s average weekly wage, not to exceed 67% of state average weekly wage. | This is an odd provision – why not just follow the same phase-in of PFL percentage benefits over the next 3 years?
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As you can see, the proposed bill would create some administration challenges, such as tracking the 2-week limitation of PFL for domestic violence reasons and the 2 additional weeks of unpaid but job-protected leave. As drafted the bill will also require employers to pay different benefit percentages for early years based on leave reason until the benefit percentage for all leave reasons reaches 67% in 2021. This bill, if passed, will go into effect on the January 1 following passage – so likely January 1, 2019. We hope for some amendments before passage!