Safe Leave Laws Gaining Momentum, with Connecticut at Forefront

The following article was first published on Shipman & Goodwin attorney Dan Schwartz’ Connecticut Employment Law Blog. It is reposted here with permission.

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Recently, I had the opportunity to talk with Law360 about developments regarding safe leave laws.

As long-time readers of this blog now, Connecticut passed its family violence leave law back in 2010.

The law prohibits an employer from terminating, penalizing, threatening, or otherwise coercing an employee with respect to their employment because the employee (1) is a family violence victim, or (2) attends or participates in a civil court proceeding related to a case in which they are a family violence victim.

The law also requires employers to allow family violence victims to take paid or unpaid leave (including compensatory time, vacation time, personal days, or other time off) during any calendar year in which the leave is reasonably necessary for a variety of listed reasons.

Since that time, Connecticut has also made such victims as eligible for paid leave benefits from the state too under recently amendments in cases of leave from work because of family violence or sexual assault of the employee or employee’s family member.

While the bill is unlikely to pass given the current stalemate in Congress, it does lay the groundwork for other states.

A new bill introduced in the U.S. Congress would extend those protections nationally.

While the bill is unlikely to pass given the current stalemate in Congress, it does lay the groundwork for other states to provide such leave too.

In the Law360 article, I discuss how Connecticut’s law has impacted employers. As I note, the impact has been fairly minimal, which is probably due to several factors including that society still not talk about such incidents publicly despite the frequency that they may occur.

Individuals are reluctant to come forward and ask for help, for example. And asking for help at work is something that many employees just don’t avail themselves as much as they can.

Nonetheless, it’s an important discussion to have and there’s no doubt that Connecticut’s law has had a small but important role in getting that discussion out in the open more.

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About the author: Dan Schwartz is a partner at Shipman & Goodwin and has decades of experience solving complex, employment law problems for companies.