Minnesota had a busy legislative session with numerous new employment laws taking effect in July, August, and January. Below are the laws taking effect July 1, along with a sneak-peek at the statewide sick leave law taking effect January 1, 2024. We’ll send another alert to prepare you for the state’s August laws (cannabis, captive audiences, and protected hairstyles) in about a month.
PREGNANCY ACCOMMODATION AND LACTATION PROTECTIONS EXPANDED
Pregnancy Accommodations
The law that requires employers to provide employees with pregnancy and childbirth accommodations now applies to employers of all sizes, not just those with 15 or more employees. It’s also expanded as follows:
Employees who take a leave of absence as an accommodation are entitled to the same or an equivalent position upon their return to work. They’re also entitled to automatic pay raises that occur during the leave and must retain any benefits and seniority as if they had no break in service.
Employers can’t require medical documentation to support an employee’s request to take longer restroom, food, or water breaks, and aren’t allowed to deny these accommodations on the basis of undue hardship.
Temporary leaves of absence and work schedule or job assignment modifications are added as examples of potential reasonable accommodations. Employers should consider these options.
Lactation Rights
Minnesota’s law regarding nursing mothers, which already applied to employers of all sizes, is expanded to cover any lactating employee (not just “mothers”), and is broadened as follows:
Lactation breaks will no longer be time-restricted to the first 12 months after the child’s birth.
Lactation breaks can’t be required to run concurrently with any other break time the employee would usually receive.
Employers aren’t allowed to deny lactation breaks based on operational needs.
Employers are required to make reasonable efforts to provide a lactation space that is clean, private, and secure.
Notice
Employers need to inform employees of their pregnancy accommodation and lactation rights upon hire and when an employee asks about parental leave. Notice must be provided in English and the employee’s primary language and must also be included in an employee handbook. The state has been charged with creating sample language, but we don’t know when it will be released.
Action Items
Create or update your lactation and pregnancy accommodation policies to be compliant.
Ensure that lactation spaces provided are clean, private, and secure.
Include a lactation and pregnancy accommodation notice in your new hire packets and your employee handbook, if you have one.
PREGNANCY AND PARENTING LEAVE EXPANDED
Minnesota’s Pregnancy and Parenting Leave law, which provides up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for pregnancy and new child bonding, is expanded to cover employers of all sizes and all employees.
This change also expands coverage for two other related laws as follows:
Minnesota’s School Conference and Activities Leave law, which provides up to 16 hours of unpaid leave for employees to attend their child’s school-related activities, now covers all employees.
Minnesota’s kin care law, which allows employees to use any sick leave they may have to care for relatives, is expanded to cover employers of all sizes and all employees.
Action Item
Add pregnancy and parental leave, school-related leave, and sick leave policies to your handbook, or, if you already have them, review them to ensure they satisfy the law’s new coverage requirements.
BLOOMINGTON REQUIRES SICK AND SAFE LEAVE
Employers of all sizes are required to provide earned sick and safe leave (ESSL) to employees who work for at least 80 hours in a year within the geographic boundaries of Bloomington. For employers with five or more employees, ESSL must be paid. For employers with four or fewer employees, ESSL may be unpaid. Employers that offer a paid time off (PTO) policy that allows employees to take the same amount of time off, for the same reasons, and under the same conditions as the ESSL law requires don’t need to offer additional leave.
Employees must begin to accrue ESSL on July 1, 2023, or their hire date—whichever is later—and must earn at least one hour of ESSL for every 30 hours worked in Bloomington. ESSL must carry over from year to year. Employers may cap ESSL accrual at 48 hours per year and 80 hours total. Under certain conditions, employers can frontload ESSL at the beginning of each year and avoid the carryover requirements.
Employees can begin to use ESSL after 90 days of employment for reasons related to their own (or their family member’s) medical needs; for certain reasons related to domestic abuse, sexual assault, and stalking; and for certain closures of the employee’s workplace or their family member’s school or place of care.
Employers must include each employee’s balance of accrued ESSL and how much they have used on each earning statement. Employers are also required to provide employees with notice of their ESSL rights by displaying a poster at each worksite. This notice must be posted in English and any other language spoken by at least 5% of employees at the worksite (if one is made available in that language by the City). Employers must also include this information in their employer handbook. The City has made compliant notices available here.
Note: On January 1, 2024, the state’s sick and safe leave law will go into effect, as discussed below. This won’t replace Bloomington’s ESSL—rather, employers will need to apply the law, or the aspect of each law, that is most favorable to employees.
Action Items
On or before July 1, 2023, if you have employees working in Bloomington:
Add a sick leave policy to your handbook or, if you already have a sick leave or PTO policy, review it to ensure it meets the requirements of the ESSL law
Display the sick leave poster at each worksite
Review the FAQs and additional materials available on the Bloomington ESSL webpage
UPCOMING: STATEWIDE PAID SICK AND SAFE LEAVE REQUIRED IN 2024
Beginning January 1, 2024, employers of all sizes are required to provide paid sick and safe leave to employees who work at least 80 hours in a year in Minnesota. We’ll provide a Law Alert with a detailed summary of the law later this year. For now, here are the highlights:
Employees begin to accrue paid sick and safe leave on January 1, 2024, or their date of hire if it’s later, and will earn one hour of leave for every 30 hours worked.
Employers can cap sick and safe leave accrual at 48 hours per year. Accrued sick and safe leave carries over from year to year, up to a total cap of 80 hours.
Sick and safe leave can be used as soon as it is accrued—there’s no waiting period.
Leave can be used for an employee’s or their family member’s medical needs; for reasons related to domestic abuse, sexual assault, and stalking; when school, work, or a place of care closes due to weather or public emergencies; and for reasons related to preventing the spread of communicable disease.
Available and used leave must be reflected on employee pay statements.
Employers must provide employees with notice about their sick and safe leave rights and include a sick and safe leave notice in the employee handbook. The Department of Labor and Industry will provide a model poster by the law’s effective date.
LOCAL MINIMUM WAGE INCREASES
On July 1, 2023, the minimum hourly wage in two Minnesota localities increases as follows:
Minneapolis
Employers with 1–100 employees: $14.50
(For employers with 101 or more employees, the current minimum hourly wage of $15.19 remains unchanged.)
St. Paul
Employers with 1–5 employees: $11.50
Employers with 6–100 employees: $13
Employers with 101–10,000 employees: $15
(For employers with 10,001 or more employees, the current minimum hourly wage of $15.19 remains unchanged.)