Moms and Kids Benefit from Washington’s Paid Maternity Leave Who Washington's Paid Family and Medical Leave is for and how to benefit

Moms and Kids

Benefit from Washington’s Paid Maternity Leave

By Maria Halcumb

12 Vancouver Family Magazine • www.vancouverfamilymagazine.com • May 2020 A hot flash of anxiety flushed through me. My heart raced, and then a thick coat of despair seemed to rest on my shoulders. I had just been informed that my maternity leave might take another 10 weeks to process. For me this meant the hours, exhaustion and deadlines would continue at work, while I barely slept each night. My son was 5 months old and my husband had just opened his own chiropractic practice in Hazel Dell. On top of all this, I was working full time from home, running a local side-hustle tutoring business and doing my best to be the main caretaker of a preschooler and infant. If that wasn’t enough, my infant had just finally recovered from a two-night stay at Randall Children’s Hospital in Portland. The medical bills had just started arriving. I’m a millennial middle-class mother. We’ve never hit extreme financial hardship even as I entered the workforce during the great recession. But, frugality has been a necessity on a teacher’s salary. With the medical bills piling up and a new business not yet making profits, the absent maternity leave I had been counting on left me in despair. I was the most exhausted I’d ever been and our family’s finances were vulnerable. Unfortunately, I’d have to wait 10 more weeks to be approved for maternity leave, which felt like an eternity when sleep deprived. When the day finally arrived that my paid leave had been processed and accepted, I was ecstatic. The governor’s stay home orders to protect against the spread of COVID-19 were in full effect, and if my family was feeling financially burdened before the virus, we were now living with less, and barely scraping by. The paid maternity leave was an opportunity for me to finally catch my breath from my full-time job. I used it to reevaluate our budget, be present with my continued on next page “ ”

I was the most exhausted

I’d ever been and our family’s finances were vulnerable.

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children, and continue to make ends meet by side-hustling with my now fully online tutoring business.

About Washington’s Paid Family and Medical Leave In 2020, Washington State rolled out a paid family and medical leave program. Individuals can receive paid time off after “a serious health condition prevents you from working or when you need time to care for a family member or a new child, or for certain military-related events.”

For example, a qualifying event could be major surgery where you can apply for paid leave. If you are married and your spouse will need to care for you, they can also apply for paid leave. To be able to receive this new assistance, employees must “have worked in Washington for 820 hours, experienced a qualifying event and be able to provide proof of identification.” There are also a few exceptions for federal employees, and people working on tribal land.

If you meet the requirements, you are eligible for “up to 12 weeksof paid family and medical leave a year. Some people may qualify for up to 16 or 18 weeks.” continued on page 14

You also don’t have to take all your leave at once. In my case, I gave birth in 2019 and used up all my company’s private paid time off and maternity leave policy in 7 weeks, before the new Washington State-provided paid leave policy went into effect. The 7 weeks provided by my employer counts against the total 12 weeks offered by the state, so to legally be able to hold onto my job, I can only take 5 more weeks from my total 12 weeks granted.

How Much Money Can Your Family Expect? You might be wondering how much of your salary will be covered by the program, especially if both parents would like to take advantage of the leave. You can expect “up to 90 percent of your weekly pay.” With a maximum of “$1,000 a week.” A weekly pay estimator is provided on Washington’s Paid Family and Medical Leave website (see sidebar on page 16).

How is the Program Funded? The medical and maternity paid leave is “funded through premiums paid by both employees and employers. The premium is 0.4 percent of employees’ gross wages, with the contribution divided between the employee and the employer.” I was notified last year that money would be taken out of my paycheck to support this new program.

If you’re a small business it is “not required to pay the employer portion of the premium, but they still collect and submit the employees’ share of the premium, and their employees are fully eligible for the benefit.” In general, the cost is a shared burden from both employees and employers.

Go to Vancouver FamilyMagazine.com for links to Washington State’s Paid Family and Medical Leave for employees and employers.

S m a l l b u s i n e s s owner Cindy Halcumb, of KC Development located in Camas, and mother of two, is thankful that the program doesn’t require small businesses to pay the employer portion, but states that, “If I lost even one employee for a 12-week period, it would be devastating to our clients and the overall success of our business.” One way to solve this is to encourage employees to take time off in small amounts. Employees don’t need to take the entire leave all at once. For example, you might “take one day off a week to care for a family member receiving chemotherapy treatment.” Still, workers must take off a minimum of 8 hours at a time. For a full-time employee that would be one workday, but for a part-time employee that may be two or more.

History of Advocacy To have this act pass as law was years in the making, and began with parents coming together to tell their stories. Momrising, founded in 2006, is a national organization based in Washington State. Its first goal was to help pass paid family leave for the state. Campaigns began with lots of phone calls and networking to get the word out. In 2007, Paid Family Leave in Washington was passed, but then later unfunded. But Momrising did not give up, working hard for ten more years to have the current Family Medical Leave Act pass in 2017.

During those years Momrising set up a listening tour in major cities across the state of Washington made up of bipartisan local, state, and federal legislators as well as business owners and community members. Vancouver

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was a major stop with Senator Ann Rivers, Senator Annette Cleveland, and Representative Sharon Wylie in attendance. The goal of the listening tour was to share experiences of caring for a child or family member. This made it easier “to have a productive conversation about the opportunities and barriers for advancing paid family and medical leave” says the Momrising storybook “When Moms Rise.” This tour created a springboard of bipartisan support to make the paid medical leave a reality in years to come.

Benefits for Washingtonians We can compare Washington State’s program to California, where a similar paid family and medical leave program was passed. Based on their results, these are the benefits Washingtonians may experience:

• Reduces Infant Mortality Rates

“Moms with paid leave are also more likely to breastfeed exclusively.”

• Prevents Children being Exposed to Poverty

“A quarter of all poverty spells are caused by the birth of a new child.”

• Could Save Taxpayer Dollars

“Women with access to paid leave are 39% less likely to receive public assistance and 40% less likely to receive food stamps in the year following a child’s birth.”

The anxiety I was feeling due to the financial, physical and emotional stressors of caring for a child are not unique to me. I share my story knowing I’m not alone. As stated above, families can be one child away from dropping into the depths of poverty. Washington’s paid family and medical leave gives those families a hand up.

As I write this, I am enjoying the first week of paid maternity leave. I have spent my time snuggling with my kiddos, enjoying a welldeserved nap (the first in months), and building strong bonds and connections with my infant son. All of this promotes the financial and emotional health of our family for years to come.

Maria Halcumb is a teacher, writer, reading specialist, and mother of two. You can find her reading books, being active in nature, minimizing her life and spending time with family and friends in Vancouver. If you want to learn more about Maria you can check out her local Southwest Washington blog Literallysimple.com and tutoring business.