The Essential Guide to Family & Medical Leave

264 | the essential guide to family and medical leave
• Some cover more family members. In California, for example, an employee
may take leave to care for a domestic partner with a serious health
condition. When an employee takes leave to care for a family member
that is not covered by the FMLA, it doesn’t count as FMLA leave.
This means, for example, that an employee in California could take 12
weeks (the state law maximum) of family leave to care for a seriously ill
domestic partner and still have 12 weeks of FMLA leave left to use.
• Some may allow longer periods of leave. In Connecticut, for example,
employees are entitled to 16 weeks of family and medical leave in a twoyear
period. If an employee needs 16 weeks at once, this provides more
leave than the FMLA requires.
Whether leave taken pursuant to one of these state laws counts as FMLA
leave depends on whether both laws apply. When an employee takes leave
for a reason that’s covered by state law but not by the FMLA (for example,
to care for a grandparent, in Hawaii), the FMLA doesn’t apply—and the
employee’s leave doesn’t use up any of his or her FMLA entitlement. If,
however, the employee’s leave is covered by both laws (for example, that
Hawaiian employee takes leave to care for a parent), the time counts against
both the employee’s FMLA and state leave entitlements.
If your company does business in a state with a comprehensive family and
medical leave statute, keep these tips in mind:
• Start by figuring out which laws apply. If the employee’s leave is covered
only by your state’s law, you don’t have to deal with the FMLA at all, and
vice versa.
• If both laws apply, the leaves run concurrently. Even if your state’s law
provides leave in situations not covered by the FMLA, the employee can’t
take that leave after using up his or her leave entitlement.
Example: Oregon’s family and medical leave law allows eligible employees to take
up to 12 weeks of leave per year for various reasons, including caring for a family
member with a serious health condition. The definition of “family member” includes
a parent-in-law. If an employee in Oregon took 12 weeks of leave to care for a child
with a serious health condition, that leave would use up both the employee’s FMLA
and state leave entitlements, and no leave would be available for the rest of the year.