President Bush Has Signed a Bill Which Amends the Family & Medical Leave Act

President Bush has signed a new law which amends the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), by granting two new types of leave to eligible employees who have family members in the military.
 
FMLA provides job protected unpaid leave to eligible employees. Employees are eligible for up to 12 weeks of FMLA if they have worked for an eligible employer for 12 months, have worked 1250 hours in the last rolling 12 month period and the employer has 50 or more employees (counting Merit Resources co-employees of other clients) within a 75 mile radius.  Eligible employees may take FMLA for the following:

Birth and care of a newborn child;
Placement of a child with the employee for adoption or foster care;
The care of a spouse, child or parent who has a serious health condition;
A serious health condition that renders the employee incapable of performing the functions of his or her job

The legislation created the following two new categories of FMLA leave:

• Leave during family member's active duty 
• Injured service member family leave (up to 26 weeks allowed)

This memo is designed to alert all employees to this recent modification to the Family & Medical Leave Act and is not intended as a complete description of the terms and conditions that will apply to applicable leave.  The Department of Labor has indicated that it will be publishing further information about the new leave categories.   Once Merit Resources has that additional information, we will update our FMLA policy in the employee handbooks and provide more written guidance to our clients about the new military related leave.  In the meantime, any employee who believes that he/she may qualify for and need FMLA leave for one of the two reasons noted above should contact their Human Resource Specialist at Merit Resources.