HELP: Stop Paid Family Leave
Tuesday, March 11, 2008

March 17, 2008

PAID FAMILY LEAVE STALLS DUE TO CONSTITUTIONAL OVERSIGHT

Senate must vote again on the bill

On Friday, March 14 – one day after the Assembly approved Paid Family Leave by a vote of 46-30 with 2 abstentions – a procedural deficiency with the bill halted its movement. Originally, the full Senate was scheduled to vote on Paid Family Leave today. If passed on concurrence with Assembly amendments, the bill would have moved to the Governor’s desk for his signature.

However, on Friday the Senate Republican Office announced in a press release that there was a flaw with the bill. According to the “bill origin” clause of the New Jersey State Constitution (Article IV, section IV, paragraph 6) any legislation that either increases existing or proposes new taxes or fees, which this bill does, must be approved by the Assembly first, then move to the Senate for a vote. Paid Family Leave was approved on March 3 by the full Senate before being heard and passing the full Assembly on March 13.

Once this new information was made available, the sponsors of Paid Family Leave – Senator Stephen Sweeney and Assemblyman Nelson Albano – released a statement requesting that Senate President Richard Codey remove the bill from today’s Senate agenda to allow them to take the appropriate steps to ensure the bill is procedurally solid. Today is the last Senate voting session scheduled. The month of April is the budget break and there has been no announced schedule of any Senate voting sessions in May at this time.

The Chamber remains committed to fighting this anti-business legislation and will keep you posted when more information becomes available. In the meantime, we urge you to continue reaching out to the members of the Senate and explain how this bill will hurt your business!

Background: A-873/S-786 calls for six weeks of Temporary Disability Insurance (TDI) benefits (down from 10 weeks) to workers to care for a newly born or adopted child, or a sick family member. This leave is in addition to the TDI benefits that women now receive for childbirth. Employees utilizing this leave would receive two-thirds of their usual wage, a maximum of $524 a week (2008 rate).

A-873/S-786 would still require businesses of all sizes to provide this leave to its workers. Besides birth and adoption, this leave could be used by employees to provide care, including psychological comfort, for a sick family member with a “serious health condition.” The definition of a family member’s “serious health condition” includes receiving treatment from a dentist, optometrist, podiatrist, advanced practice nurse, or chiropractor. Further, employees may utilize this paid family leave on an intermittent basis throughout the year.

What can you tell legislators and the Governor?

Any amount of Paid Family Leave is not good, and will increase the cost of doing business and make New Jersey an even less competitive environment for business. Since this program would provide workers with two-thirds of their weekly wages (with a maximum of $524), there is no doubt that many more employees will avail themselves of paid family leave! Companies will have to hire and train temporary workers to fill the void of those employees who are out on leave, and pay overtime to other workers who will have to absorb the work of the employee on leave. There are many positions within companies that require technical training – and finding temporary workers in such technically oriented positions will be difficult to impossible. The burden will be placed on other employees to cover their co-worker’s tasks and/or train the temporary employees, the costs of which are significant. Lowered morale, decreased productivity, overtime costs and disruption to the workplace will surely be experienced as more workers take advantage of this generous leave policy.

New Jersey already has paid leave for childbirth. In fact, New Jersey is one of only six states that provide Temporary Disability Insurance benefits (TDI) for pregnancy, up to four weeks before the expected delivery date and six to eight weeks after the delivery date – a total of ten to twelve weeks of paid TDI benefits, which can be extended for difficult pregnancies. This bill proposes to extend that leave an additional six weeks.

Let employers decide how to accommodate their employees’ leave needs. The one-size-fits-all model of this bill removes all flexibility for employers and employees to decide how to accommodate leaves to care for sick family members. In fact, the proponents’ own study showed that businesses “have developed systematic and often quite ingenious methods of handling” how work is covered during family leaves. Employers do “do the right thing” as part of their efforts to retain good employees!

Paid family leave is an employee benefit that should be subject to collective bargaining. This bill legislates an employee benefit that is best left to the collective bargaining process, and unnecessarily imposes government control over the way businesses operate.

The logistical challenges and cost of implementing a paid family leave system will pose yet another challenge to business. Businesses will now have to track every hour an employee utilizes this new paid family leave time, and then submit paperwork to the state so that the employee receives TDI benefits for that leave time. Employers will also need to track paperwork from the employee’s family member’s physician to confirm that the family member has a “serious health condition” covered in the bill.

This legislation is a tax increase for your employees!! The funding of this program is through imposition of an additional tax on employees’ wages. Should this fund not adequately support the number of employees utilizing the paid leave program, workers can expect tax increases to cover the deficit.

This legislation would put New Jersey out of synch with other States making us even more unfriendly to business! And, with the economy on the decline, now is not the time to impose an unnecessary, costly and disruptive requirement on business.

Recent studies have underscored New Jersey’s poor business climate. The Tax Foundation’s 2008 State Business Tax Climate Index ranked New Jersey 49^th. Our State has consistently been ranked in the bottom three states (either 47^th or 48^th) since 2003!

Rutgers University’s recently released study showed that New Jersey’s sharp decline in population growth – more people moving out of the state than moving in – has resulted in the loss of close to $8 billion in lost income between 2000 and 2005. The researchers pointed to the need for the State to adopt policies to restore business confidence. This measure only further erodes that confidence!

The Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council’s Survival Guide ranks New Jersey last in the nation because of our State’s policies toward small business.

CALL TO ACTION!

VOICE YOUR CONCERNS REGARDING HOW THIS PROPOSAL WOULD

IMPACT YOUR BUSINESS TO THESE KEY OFFICIALS!!!

MEMBERS OF THE NEW JERSEY SENATE

Senator Andrew R. Ciesla (R10) – senciesla@njleg.org

Senator Anthony R. Bucco (R25) – senbucco@njleg.org

Senator Barbara Buono (D18) – senbuono@njleg.org

Senator Bill Baroni (R14) – senbaroni@njleg.org

Senator Bob Smith (D17) – sensmith@njleg.org

Senator Brian P. Stack (D33) – senstack@njleg.org

Senator Christopher "Kip" Bateman (R16) – senbateman@njleg.org

Senator Christopher J. Connors (R9) – senconnors@njleg.org

Senator Dana Redd (D5) – senredd@njleg.org

Senator Diane B. Allen (R7) – senallen@njleg.org

Senator Fred H. Madden, Jr. (D4) – senmadden@njleg.org

Senator Gerald Cardinale, D.D.S. (R39) – sencardinale@njleg.org

Senator Jeff Van Drew (D1) – senvandrew@njleg.org

Senator Jennifer Beck (R12) – senbeck@njleg.org

Senator Jim Whelan (D2) – senwhelan@njleg.org

Senator John A. Girgenti (D35) – sengirgenti@njleg.org

Senator John H. Adler (D6) – senadler@njleg.org

Senator Joseph F. Vitale (D19) – senvitale@njleg.org

Senator Joseph M. Kyrillos, Jr. (R13) – senkyrillos@njleg.org

Senator Joseph Pennacchio (R26) – senpennacchio@njleg.org

Senator Kevin J. O'Toole (R40) – senotoole@njleg.org

Senator Leonard Lance (R23) – senlance@njleg.org

Senator Loretta D. Weinberg (D37) - senweinberg@njleg.org

Senator M. Teresa Ruiz (D29) – senruiz@njleg.org

Senator Nia H. Gill, Esq. (D34) – sengill@njleg.org

Senator Nicholas J. Sacco (D32) – sensacco@njleg.org

Senator Nicholas P. Scutari (D22) – senscutari@njleg.org

Senator Paul A. Sarlo (D36) – sensarlo@njleg.org

Senator Philip E. Haines (R8) – senhaines@njleg.org

Senator Raymond J. Lesniak (D20) – senlesniak@njleg.org

Senator Robert M. Gordon (D38) – sengordon@njleg.org

Senator Robert W. Singer (R30) – sensinger@njleg.org

Senator Ronald L. Rice (D28) – senrice@njleg.org

Senator Sandra B. Cunningham (D31) – sencunningham@njleg.org

Senator Sean T. Kean (R11) – senkean@njleg.org

Senator Shirley K. Turner (D15) – senturner@njleg.org

Senator Stephen M. Sweeney (D3) – sensweeney@njleg.org

Senator Steven V. Oroho (R24) – senoroho@njleg.org

Senator Thomas H. Kean, Jr. (R21) – senkean@njleg.org