Bill > S2454

Introduced Session

The bill enhances certain worker benefits and protections, including in public emergencies, by: 1. Specifying that, for the sake of being eligible for unemployment benefits, "good cause" for voluntarily leaving work includes being compelled to work in circumstances that violate health and safety standards or otherwise jeopardize health, either because the employer has not taken sufficient measures to alleviate exposures to communicable disease or other health or safety hazards, or because such measures are not feasible with respect to the available work, and that work is not "suitable" work for which an individual is disqualified from benefits for not accepting if the work compels the individual to work in those circumstances. 2. Reducing the minimum weekly earnings required in each of 20 base weeks for a worker to be eligible for family leave insurance (FLI) and temporary disability insurance (TDI) benefits from 20 to 10 times the State minimum wage, and reducing the alternative annual earnings required for eligibility from 1,000 to 500 times the State minimum wage. 3. Requiring that an employer who lays off employees during the state of emergency declared by the Governor on March 9, 2020, and any subsequent extensions of that state of emergency, to give those employees the right of first refusal for any subsequent employment openings with the employer in positions for which they are qualified.

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Loretta Weinberg (D)*, 

Introduced in the Senate, Referred to Senate Labor Committee (on 05/07/2020)