Cal-Peculiarities: How California Employment Law is Different 2022 Edition

50 | 2022 Cal-Peculiarities ©2022 Seyfarth Shaw LLP  www.seyfarth.com Cal/OSHA regulations—all counted toward leave required by the Sonoma ordinance. 195 Employers of health care workers and emergency first responders have a limited ability to deny leave for family care where staffing shortages would result. West Hollywood . West Hollywood’s PSL mandate took effect on January 1, 2022 for “hotel employers” and will take effect on July 1, 2022 for other employers. 196 The ordinance includes a minimum wage component and requires coordination between PTO and vacation. 197 Employers must provide at least 96 compensated hours off per year for sick leave, vacation, or personal necessity to full-time employees (those working at least 40 hours per week or whom the employer deems full- time, whichever is more generous). 198 Employers must make this time available at the employee’s request. Under the ordinance, after the first six months of employment (or pursuant to a more generous employer policy), full-time employees shall accrue at least 96/52 hours of compensated time off each week in a calendar year that the employee has been employed by the Employer. 199 Compensated time off does not accrue for work in excess of 40 hours a week, subject to legally-protected exceptions. 200 Full-time employees who work less than 40 hours a week receive the compensated time off in proportional increments. 201 Unused accrued compensated time off will carry over until the time off reaches a maximum of 192 hours, unless the employer’s established policy is more generous. 202 Once an employee reaches the maximum accrued compensated time off, an employer must provide a cash payment once every 30 days for accrued compensation time off over the maximum. 203 Employers cannot require employees to cash out any accrued compensated time off under the maximum. 204 Employers can forego this payment by not having a cap at all, but that would result in an unlimited amount of accrued time off. Employers must also permit full-time employees to take at least 80 additional hours per year of uncompensated time off to be used for sick leave where the employee has exhausted their compensated time off for that year. 205 Employees must be eligible to use accrued uncompensated time off after the first six months of employment or consistent with company policies, whichever is sooner. 206 Unused, accrued uncompensated time off will carry over until the time off reaches a maximum of 80 hours, unless the employer’s established policy is more generous. 207 Notably, the ordinance is silent with regard to the issue of payout upon separation. Thus, employers should follow California’s requirements with regard to separation pay as it pertains to vacation pay. 208 2.15 Paid Leave for Organ or Bone Marrow Donation California employers must grant eligible employees leaves of absence to donate an organ or to donate bone marrow. An employee employed for at least 90 days may take up to five business days of paid leave during any one-year period to donate bone marrow, and up to 30 business days of paid leave during any one-year period to donate an organ. Employers must grant an additional unpaid leave of absence, up to 30 business days during a one-year period, for the purpose of organ donation. 209 The one-year period is measured forward from the date an employee’s leave begins. Employers may require employees to use up to five days of earned but unused sick leave or vacation or paid time off during the initial bone-marrow donation leave, and up to two weeks of earned but unused sick leave or vacation or paid time off during the initial organ-donation leave. These leaves are not a break in service for purposes of any right to salary adjustments, sick leave, vacation, annual leave, or seniority, and employers must maintain and pay for group health coverage during the leaves. These leaves do not run concurrently with FMLA and CFRA leaves. Employees returning from leave generally must be reinstated to their same position or an equivalent position. 210