New York City Council Amends Bill to Provide Paid Sick Time in New York City

As discussed in the October 2009 issue of the New Jersey eAuthority, a bill was introduced last year that would have amended the administrative code of the City of New York to, among other things: (1) require NYC employers to provide their employees with a minimum of one hour of paid sick time (to use for their own sickness or to care for a sick family member) for every 30 hours worked (up to a maximum of 72 hours/year for employers with 10 or more employees, and up to a maximum of 40 hours/year for employers with less than 10 employees); (2) create a rebuttable presumption of retaliation whenever any adverse action happens to be taken against the employee within 90 days after exercising certain rights under the law; and (3) mandate additional posting and recordkeeping requirements.

• Setting the annual maximum 72 hours of paid sick leave as applicable only to employers with 20 or more employees (as opposed to 10 or more employees), and the annual maximum of 40 hours of paid sick leave applicable to employers with 19 or fewer employees (as opposed to nine or fewer employees)
• Removing the rebuttable presumption of retaliation;
• Limiting the definition of “family members” who employees can use sick leave to take care of;
• Eliminating the availability of sick leave to deal with domestic violence issues;
• Relaxing certain recordkeeping and posting requirements (for instance, requiring records to be maintained for three, rather than five years and requiring the City to create the required posters);
• Clarifying that employers that already provide employees enough paid time off sufficient to meet the requirements of this law would not have to provide their employees with additional paid sick leave under this law; and
• Making any law passed effective 180 days after enactment, rather than 90 days after enactment.

Since the May 11 hearing, the Committee has taken comments from interested parties (particularly, business owners and unions) about the bill’s amended language. The Committee intends to cease taking comments at the end of June, when it will schedule a date for a second hearing and possible Committee vote. If this law ultimately passes, New York City would join San Francisco and Washington, D.C. to become just the third U.S. city to pass a law mandating private sector employers to provide employees with paid sick leave.