Alabama state employees would receive paid parental leave under a bill approved in a House committee on Tuesday. It will be on the House floor today.
Rep. Ginny Shaver, R-Leesburg, is the sponsor of House Bill 309. It grants certain state employees eight weeks of paid parental leave following the birth of a child or the placement of a child 3 or younger. Additionally, it allows spouses employed within the same state agencies eight combined weeks of paid leave, with exceptions.
“Currently, we have a greater than 15% turnover in state employees, which is a 20-year high,” Shaver said Tuesday, highlighting concerns about current employee recruitment and retention.
She explained the need for this bill because paid parental leave was the No. 1 suggestion from Gov. Kay Ivey’s study group that investigated recommendations for recruiting state employees.
“This is a growing trend across the country and many of our southeastern state counterparts already provide some form of paid parental leave,” State Personnel Director Laury Morgan told ADN. “This bill would bring us in line with our neighboring states and could likely assist with the recruitment and retention of state employees.”
If approved, paid leave would cost the state a maximum of about $8,600 per employee who uses it, a fiscal note on the bill says.
Shaver said many private employers offer paid parental leave. It’s also offered to state employees by southern states including Louisiana, South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Missouri, Tennessee, Arkansas, Florida, Virginia and the city of Birmingham.
There is currently no paid leave for state employees but they can take up to 12 weeks unpaid under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, their own accrued leave and donated leave from co-workers.
The bill eliminates the option of donated leave for new parents so there is no “double dipping,” Shaver said.
Under this bill, parental leave would be paid at 100 percent of the employee’s base pay and requires the state to continue to provide the employee with any health care benefits that they had before the commencement of leave.
Shaver discussed a study done by the Harvard Business School that found “one in three workers have to quit their jobs to care for the responsibility of their children.” She shared that it’s possible for these people to get on public assistance and cost the state more money in the future.
Shaver emphasized the importance of paid parental leave, noting that not all daycares accept newborns, so eight weeks of paid parental leave covers enough time for the parents to find suitable care.