BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 579
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Date of Hearing: August 19, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Jimmy Gomez, Chair
SB 579
(Jackson) - As Amended July 16, 2015
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Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: NoReimbursable: No
SUMMARY:
This bill expands the reasons an employee can take job-protected
time off from work under the Family School Partnership Act and
specified "kin care" sick leave provisions of existing law.
Specifically, this bill:
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1)Expands the law to allow workers to take time off to: (a)
find, enroll, or reenroll his or her child in a school of with
a licensed child care provider; and (b) to address a child
care provider or school emergency, as defined.
2)Defines "child care provider or school emergency" to mean that
an employee's child cannot remain in school or with a child
care provider due to one of the following:
a) The school or child care provider has requested that the
child be picked up, or has an attendance policy, excluding
planned holidays, that prohibits the child from attending
or requires the child to be picked up from the school or
child care provider.
b) Behavioral or discipline problems.
c) Closure of unexpected unavailability of the school or
child care provider, excluding planned holidays.
d) A natural disaster, including, but not limited to, fire,
earthquake or flood.
3)Revises provisions of the existing "kin care" law to be
consistent with the provisions under recent paid sick days
legislation to clarify that "family member" includes a parent,
guardian, stepparent, foster parent, or grandparent of, or a
person who stands in place of a parent to a child. Further
clarifies that the worker can take sick leave for the reasons
currently specified in law.
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4)Prohibits an employer from denying sick leave or
discriminating against an employee for attending to an illness
or the preventive care of a family member.
FISCAL EFFECT:
The Department of Industrial Relations indicates
minor/absorbable costs related to implementation and enforcement
of this bill.
COMMENTS:
1)Background. The California School Partnership Act allows
parents, grandparents, and guardians to take up to 40 hours
per year to participate in their children's school or child
care activities. The law is applicable to employers with 25 or
more employees. Employees can use existing vacation, personal
leave, compensatory time off or take unpaid leave for these
purposes.
Current law, also known as "Kin Care" authorizes employees to
use up to one-half of the sick leave that they accrue
annually, to take time off to care for a sick family member.
Employees do not receive additional sick leave under Kin Care.
Instead, sick leave taken under Kin Care is protected and may
not be "counted against" or used as a basis for disciplining
an employee for absenteeism, for example.
The Healthy Workplaces Healthy Families Act provides, as of
July 1, 2015, an employee who works in California for 30 or
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more days within a year from the commencement of employment is
entitled to paid sick days at the rate of not less than one
hour per every 30 hours worked (to be taken after the 90th day
of employment). The Act allows workers to use paid sick days
for the diagnosis, care, or treatment of an existing health
condition of, or preventive care for, the employee or the
employee's family member (defined as a child, parent, spouse,
registered domestic partner, grandparent, grandchild and
sibling) or specified purposes, as defined, for an employee
who is a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, or
stalking.
2)Purpose. This bill amends the California School Partnership
Act to allow parents to use leave to care for a child during a
child care or school emergency, and to take job-protected time
off from work to find (and enroll) child care or school for
their children.
This bill also amends the Kin Care law to more closely align
with the Healthy Workplaces Healthy Families Act by allowing
parents to use their sick days to take their family members to
a preventative health appointment.
This bill does not increase the amount of time off parents are
entitled to under these laws, but rather expands the permitted
use of those laws to cover child care emergencies and
enrollment.
Analysis Prepared by:Misty Feusahrens / APPR. / (916)
319-2081
SB 579
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