{
  "id": "R44693",
  "type": "CRS Report",
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      "id": 458880,
      "date": "2017-02-09",
      "retrieved": "2017-02-15T21:41:36.056600",
      "title": "Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA): Proposed Legislation in the 114th Congress",
      "summary": "The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA; P.L. 103-3, as amended) entitles eligible employees to unpaid, job-protected leave for certain family and medical needs, with continuation of group health plan benefits. \nThrough the act, Congress sought to strike a balance between workplace responsibilities and workers\u2019 growing need to take leave for significant family and medical events. Subsequently, Congress added new categories of leave that allow eligible employees to address certain military exigencies stemming from the deployment of a close family member to a foreign country and to care for a servicemember with a serious injury or illness who is a close family member. The act has also been amended to expand access to certain legislative branch employees and to clarify eligibility criteria for airline flight crew. FMLA was last amended in 2009.\nFMLA remains an issue of interest for Members, and the 114th Congress considered several proposals to amend the act in various ways: \nAdditional leave entitlements. Two bills would have created a new entitlement to take leave for certain family members\u2019 school or community activities (H.R. 5535, H.R. 5518) and for the employee\u2019s own routine medical needs or that of certain family members (H.R. 5518 only). \nNew FMLA-qualifying uses of the existing leave entitlement. Several proposals aimed to allow employees to use the existing entitlement for new categories of leave, including bereavement (S. 1302/H.R. 2260, S. 473), domestic violence and its effects (S. 473), family involvement (S. 473; in addition to new leave entitlements in H.R. 5535, H.R. 5518), and medical leave for veterans with service-connected disabilities rated at 30% or higher (H.R. 5165).\nBroader application of existing FMLA-qualifying uses of leave. Five bills proposed to expand employee\u2019s options for using the current set of FMLA-qualifying uses of leave by either broadening the set of relationships for which an employee may use family leave (S. 473, H.R. 5519, H.R. 5701) or amending definitions referenced in the descriptions of the current entitlement (S. 473, H.R. 5519, and H.R. 5701 sought to amend the definition of son or daughter to include adult children; and S. 2584/H.R. 4616 proposed amending the definition of serious health condition to reference the recovery from organ donation surgery as a possible condition).\nLess-restrictive eligibility requirements, generally, and separate requirements for certain worker groups. For general eligibility, H.R. 5518 aimed to reduce the minimum number of employees required within 75 miles of an employee\u2019s worksite from 50 employees to 15 employees and H.R. 5496 sought to amend the general hours-of-service requirement to remove the minimum of \u201c1,250 hours of service ... during the previous 12-month period\u201d and allow eligible workers to be \u201cpart-time or full-time\u201d employees. H.R. 5165 would have provided new eligibility requirements for certain veterans that allowed them to use FMLA leave for medical treatment related to a service-connected disability rated at 30% or higher sooner than the standard 12-month employment requirement. S. 3444 would have created a separate hours-of-service requirement for educational support professionals.",
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      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 457156,
      "date": "2016-11-21",
      "retrieved": "2016-11-28T21:05:05.303666",
      "title": "Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA): Proposed Legislation in the 114th Congress",
      "summary": "The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA; P.L. 103-3, as amended) entitles eligible employees to unpaid, job-protected leave for certain family and medical needs, with continuation of group health plan benefits. \nThrough the act, Congress sought to strike a balance between workplace responsibilities and workers\u2019 growing need to take leave for significant family and medical events. Subsequently, Congress added new categories of leave that allow eligible employees to address certain military exigencies stemming from the deployment of a close family member to a foreign country and to care for a servicemember with a serious injury or illness who is a close family member. The act has also been amended to expand access to certain legislative branch employees and to clarify eligibility criteria for airline flight crew. FMLA was last amended in 2009.\nThe 114th Congress is considering several proposals to amend FMLA leave in various ways: \nAdditional leave entitlements. Two bills would create a new entitlement to take leave for certain family members\u2019 school or community activities (H.R. 5535, H.R. 5518) and for the employee\u2019s own routine medical needs or that of certain family members (H.R. 5518 only). \nNew FMLA-qualifying uses of the existing leave entitlement. Several proposals would allow employees to use the existing entitlement for new categories of leave, including bereavement (S. 1302/H.R. 2260, S. 473), domestic violence and its effects (S. 473), family involvement (S. 473; in addition to new leave entitlements in H.R. 5535, H.R. 5518), and medical leave for veterans with service-connected disabilities rated at 30% or higher (H.R. 5165).\nBroader application of existing FMLA-qualifying uses of leave. Five bills would expand employee\u2019s options for using the current set of FMLA-qualifying uses of leave by either expanding the set of relationships for which an employee may use family leave (S. 473, H.R. 5519, H.R. 5701) or amending definitions referenced in the descriptions of the current entitlement (S. 473, H.R. 5519, and H.R. 5701 amend the definition of son or daughter to include adult children; and S. 2584/H.R. 4616 amends the definition of serious health condition to reference the recovery from organ donation surgery as a possible condition).\nLess-restrictive eligibility requirements, generally, and separate requirements for certain worker groups. For general eligibility, H.R. 5518 would reduce the minimum number of employees required within 75 miles of an employee\u2019s worksite from 50 employees to 15 employees and H.R. 5496 would amend the general hours-of-service requirement to remove the minimum of \u201c1,250 hours of service ... during the previous 12-month period\u201d and allow eligible workers to be \u201cpart-time or full-time\u201d employees. H.R. 5165 provides new eligibility requirements for certain veterans that would allow them to use FMLA leave for medical treatment related to a service-connected disability rated at 30% or higher sooner than the standard 12-month employment requirement. S. 3444 would create a separate hours-of-service requirement for educational support professionals.",
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      "typeId": "REPORTS",
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  "topics": [
    "National Defense"
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}