Mayor de Blasio, left, and Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, second from left, speak with workers about a plan to expand paid sick leave for about 500,000 workers in the city. Photo courtesy NYC Mayor’s Office
Following Mayor de Blasio’s announcement at the end of last week that he wants a major overhaul of the way paid sick leave is conducted throughout the city, the City Council has already acted on it and introduced legislation Wednesday that would expand the benefit to 500,000 workers in the five boroughs.
“For far too long, thousands of New Yorkers have been forced to choose between taking a sick day or earning a paycheck,” de Blasio said in a statement Wednesday. “The expansion of paid sick leave will improve the lives of thousands of this city’s working people and their families, and I am proud to fight for this critical progressive reform.”
In an about face from the years of tense debate over paid sick leave during the Bloomberg administration, de Blasio and Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito (D-Manhattan) said they want to see businesses with five or more employees provide five days of paid sick time.
Bloomberg had long been opposed to the measure, which he said would financially burden small businesses. A bill ultimately passed that mandated businesses with 15 or more employees offer at least five sick days per year. That legislation was poised to go into effect in April, though it would become moot if the new bill is passed, which it is expected to do.
“It’s time for our laws to live up to our values,” Mark-Viverito said. “…We are going to make sure that no one is thrown into crisis and insecurity just because they get sick. This is the culmination of a movement and coalition that has put the rights and needs of families at the center of our agenda.”
The expanded paid sick leave legislation will cover an additional 355,000 New Yorkers – more than 200,000 of whom do not currently receive the benefit, de Blasio said. It would also eliminate the phase-in that was called for in the bill passed during Bloomberg’s tenure, which would have delayed coverage to workers at businesses between 15 and 20 employees. This, the mayor said, means 140,000 people who would have waited until mid-2015 under the existing bill will have coverage come April.
Additionally, the new bill would remove exemptions for the manufacturing sector, extending paid sick leave coverage to 76,000 workers – half of whom do not currently have the benefit.
The new legislation adds grandparents, grandchildren and siblings to the definition of family members workers can legally care for using paid sick time.
For Leonardo Hernando, a car-wash worker in Queens, the new bill, he said, will make a huge difference in his life.
“I have lived and worked in this country for nine years,” he said. “In all that time, I’ve never once had a job that provided paid sick days. With four kids to support, I can’t afford a day off, even when I’m sick. That meant going to work with a fever and with the flu. But all that will change with this new law.”
By Anna Gustafson
