BILL ANALYSIS �
SB 299
Page 1
Date of Hearing: July 13, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Felipe Fuentes, Chair
SB 299 (Evans) - As Introduced: February 14, 2011
Policy Committee: Labor and
Employment Vote: 4-2
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable: No
SUMMARY
This bill requires employers to maintain and pay for a pregnant
employee's medical coverage during her pregnancy leave, as
specified. Specifically, this bill:
1)Prohibits an employer from refusing to maintain and pay for
coverage of an eligible female employee during her pregnancy
leave, as long as the leave does not exceed four months over
the course of a 12 month period and the coverage is provided
under the same conditions as if she did not take leave.
2)Authorizes an employer to recover from the employee the
premium it paid for maintaining coverage for the employee
under the group health plan, if both of the following
conditions occur:
a) The employee fails to return from leave after the period
of leave to which the employee is entitled has expired.
b) The employee's failure to return from leave is for a
reason other than one of the following:
i) The employee taking leave under the California
Family Rights Act (CFRA).
ii) The continuation, recurrence, or onset of a health
condition that entitles the employee to pregnancy leave
or other circumstances beyond the control of the
employee.
FISCAL EFFECT
1)Negligible costs to the Department of Fair Employment Housing
to enforce this measure. DFEH reports they currently
SB 299
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investigate complaints related to pregnancy disability leave
(PDL) and the California Family Rights Act (CFRA).
2)To the extent that current state employees do not quality for
health care coverage under the CFRA, the state is likely to
incur significant GF costs, likely in the hundreds of
thousands to low millions, to continue providing health care
coverage pursuant to this measure.
COMMENTS
1)Background . Existing law establishes the CFRA, which requires
employers with 50 or more employees to provide, upon request,
up to 12 weeks of protected unpaid leave during any 12-month
period for specified purposes, including childbirth.
Statute also provides an employee disabled by pregnancy,
childbirth, or a related medical condition to take PDL for
reasonable period of time not to exceed four months.
2)Purpose . According to the author, "While the PDL provides
leave for pregnancy-related conditions, the law does not
require employers to continue group health insurance coverage
for an employee during leave. As a result, many new mothers
are denied benefits while on leave. Forced to pay
out-of-pocket costs for health coverage, many women will delay
or cut short their leave despite well-documented benefits to
maternal and child health. Almost four-fifths of workers
report being unable to take leave because they could not
afford it. This bill amends the Pregnancy Disability Leave
law to guarantee the continuation of employer-provided health
insurance coverage for women on pregnancy disability leave."
Analysis Prepared by : Kimberly Rodriguez / APPR. / (916)
319-2081