Testing, Testing... Did You Miss Us?

In this episode of Leave It to Us, Brycie and Christine discuss the latest developments in paid family and medical leave laws across various states, focusing on Virginia’s new program, upcoming changes, and strategic preparations for employers.

Recorded on June 24, 2026

Enjoy the commentary from these two experts from The Partners Group, a leading resource in the absence management industry. You can listen to every episode on our website.

Brycie Wasson

Brycie has spent her entire career in absence and disability management. She began administering FMLA leaves for one of our nation’s largest retailers, and she soon advanced to oversee an absence and disability benefits program for a private financial services firm. She implemented multiple successful absence solutions, including harmonizing policy and practices, creating a formal ADA evaluation process, and integrating a leave management software solution. Brycie has been with The Partners Group since 2017.

Christine Hinnerichs
Christine has over 15 years of absence management and disability experience in the non- and for-profit sectors, as well as nearly 20 years of experience in HR. Her extensive background on the client side of absence management and disability helps her navigate and create solutions for unique client challenges. Christine has a BA in business administration from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. She earned her PHR Certification in 2006 and her Life and Annuities, Sickness, Accident and Health Insurance Producer’s License in 2021. Christine has been with The Partners Group since 2020.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Hi everyone, welcome back. It's been a few months. Um, we've got a fresh new look, but I I don't want to alarm you. It's still the same fun faces, comedy, and content, but we're coming at you with a new brand. We are now leave it to us with Brycey and Christine. So a lot of you are probably wondering, what have these two been up to for the past couple months? Well, other than sunning ourselves, obviously, we have been implementing, or we have implemented rather 300 new private plan clients for the state of Maine. So we've been very busy there. And with a couple month hiatus, we want to update you all on some of the latest happenings throughout the country. We're gonna a little bit more heavily focus on paid family and medical leave, but I'm gonna finish you out with an update straight from the Jersey shore and what some new happenings are in that state with regards to the relief loss. So I'm gonna kick it over to Brycey. She's gonna talk to us a little bit about what's been happening in Virginia. Very exciting stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Yes, I am so, so excited to be able to kick off this portion of our episode with my four favorite words. I told you so. The last time we recorded a longer podcast episode, it was all about uh paid family and medical leave and the monumental decision that is how do we participate in in paid family and medical leave. And we foreshadowed at that time, way back in March, that Virginia was on the verge of passing the next statewide paid family and medical leave mandate. So uh back here with you all, um I am uh thrilled to let you know if you don't already that that has now come to pass. So today, um to set the stage for Virginia for you all, I'm gonna I'm gonna cover the program really super high level. And then just know that in the coming days, you will be seeing a lot more um of TPG TAM out and about in Virginia representing um us as ourselves, but also assisting our broker partners that work out of that state as well. So uh at some point, the Virginians will probably be ready to kick us out of there because we're gonna get in it. Uh all right, so starting with just a very broad timeline, we had this law pass on April 22nd. That's when the governor signed it into law. And really, uh no key program uh established dates between that and April or excuse me, from now to um October of 2027 is our next big key program date. So between now and October of 2027, what we're going to have is a lot of program formation activity through the state. So the state's going to be working to identify key players, who are they going to hire to build this program, putting those folks in those key roles, deciding how they are going to administer this program. Um we have we had other states uh either formally or informally consider like, are we going to set up the infrastructure to run this plan ourselves? Are we going to bring in a third-party administrator like our friends in Maine and other states? And so there's just going to be a lot of that happening. And I'm, I'm, uh, I'm kind of waiting to discern how formally that program formation will occur and more importantly, how publicly that program formation will occur. So it works a little bit different in every state. Um, and uh so we're we're really starting to dig into how we can expect uh, you know, uh to uh keep our customers abreast of what's happening between now and October of 2027. There's a lot to accomplish in that time. I will say generally, Virginia passed this law with a very aggressive timeline. So there's a lot that they need to do in a short period of time. The next key date we're gonna hit, as I've said, is October of 2027, which is when the state has committed to us that they will set their initial contribution rate. So how much employers and employees will have to contribute to fund the benefits that will ultimately go out to Virginia employees. What we do know is that whatever that contribution rate is, there will be a 50-50 split between employers and employees for any covered employer in Maine that has over 10 employees. The next key deadline we're tracking towards is April 1st of 2028, and that is when we start paying those contributions into the program. So while we will not know the contribution rate until potentially October of 27, the obligation to start paying hits us right away in April of 28. And that is going to be a challenge, a challenge for us to get ready, a huge challenge for the private plan community who really likes to know and understand what that rate is going to be before they will start issuing their own quotes. Um, and so this will be a this will be a struggle in Virginia. And then the the final like key deadline that we're marching towards is is really December 1st of 2028, when employees in Virginia can start to access the benefits under that program. So I'll just say high level, this program will uh will provide benefits to most of the employees in Virginia. The big exclusion in Virginia is actually employees of the state who will be excluded. Um, it's gonna provide 12 weeks of uh benefits as well as job protection as long as an employee has met 120 days of employment with you. Um and that's gonna provide a benefit of up to 80% income replacement to those eligible employees. Um, it's gonna provide uh leave for all of the same reasons we see covered under FMLA, but we're also adding a bucket under the Virginia Leave plan for safety leave. So that's uh if if uh an employee needs leave due to domestic violence, harassment, sexual assault, or stalking, um, that will now be a covered leave reason under Virginia, paid family and medical leave. And then uh for care of a family member, this law is going to cover uh family members that are extant expanded beyond that FMLA definition. And so some of the additional family members that we'll see covered are siblings and grandparents and grandchildren, and then that ever-dreaded, they are they feel like a family member to me. Um, and so ergo, they're considered a covered family member under Virginia law. Um we uh do uh have in Virginia the ability to take leave on a continuous and an intermittent basis. This is common now. We see this in in you know all of all of the state leave laws that have passed in the last, or paid family and medical leave laws that have passed in the last five plus years, um, the ability to access more broadly intermittent leave than what we've had under FMLA. Um and then the big E in Virginia is that they will allow us to participate either through the state-run plan, however the state sets that up, or through a self-funded or fully insured private plan. So for those of you who have gone through this in um Maine and Massachusetts and Connecticut or DC, like we we have uh we have some private plan options in uh in Virginia. And so we are gonna spend a lot, a significant amount of time, Christine and I and our team helping our customers understand what the right pathway is. Um and so that's that's a uh really quick and dirty overview of what's going on with with Virginia paid family and medical leave. And if that wasn't enough, uh we got another gift in May in Virginia, and that is a passage or really an expansion of the existing paid sick leave law that existed in Virginia that previously covered a very tiny segment of employees in Virginia, um, but now has been expanded and will cover virtually all employees uh in in that state by 2029. Um and so we saw that law pass on May 20th of this year. Um and uh again, the the paid sick leave is going to be uh provide coverage to all employees of private employers and state and local government. And so we're gonna see a phased-in approach of this paid sick leave law where uh by July 1st of 2027, employers with at least 50 employees will be required to comply. By January 1st, 2028, employers with at least 25 employees will be required to comply. And then beginning January 1st of 2029, we go all the way down to one employee. Employers with at least one employee are required to comply with the new paid sick leave law. Uh the covered employers are gonna uh or employees have to accrue a minimum of one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours work. That's gonna be the accrual rate, and that kicks in as of date of hire. Um, employers do not have to allow employees to use more than 40 hours of paid sick leave in a year, and the reasons for the use of uh paid sick leave are gonna be um expanded to include services related to domestic violence and sexual assault and stalking. So, again, we have that kind of safety uh time off provision being added to the paid family and medical leave law and to the paid sick leave law in Virginia. So, what we do know is that uh an employer's existing paid time off policy could possibly satisfy these requirements if you're providing at least 40 hours of leave usable for the same purposes and on the same conditions as the statute. So we have a similarity here again between uh what the state is telling us about paid family and medical leave and paid sick leave is you are required to participate in this. There is no opting out. You can participate via the plan structure that we set up. Or, you know, in this case, if you have your own, you know, PTO paid sick leave plan that provides at least as good of what we're setting out for you here that can satisfy the requirement. For the paid family and medical leave, I will say, you know, we are either uh uh uh participating through the state plan or we are we are putting in a fully insured uh equivalent plan or a self-funded equivalent plan. And the state's gonna build a lot of rules around what those plans need to look like. So for the purposes of paid family and medical leave, it's not gonna be as simple as our current plans provide the same or better benefits. So we're good. That's a thing for paid sick leave, not so much for paid family and medical leave. And sorry to commingle the two, but it's just too fun. The uh uh the last thing I want to cover for you, just to give you a jump start on feeling prepared for what's coming at you for the paid family and medical leave law is just a couple of notes on readiness. So unfortunately, a huge piece of what we, the employer community, need to understand the impact of what is coming at us with paid family and medical leave is the contribution rate. And um at this point, the state is is it does not have to give us that until October of 2027. And um I encourage you, like myself, to start approaching the state of Virginia and asking for that a little bit sooner, please. That would be most helpful. Um but drafting an email, what's that, Christine?

SPEAKER_00 11:45

I said drafting an email now to the state of Virginia. Yes, please give us the contribution rate ASAP.

SPEAKER_01 11:50

Draft a polite correspondence to your state representative on that note. Um there are still things that we can be doing to prepare. So there are uh understanding the state posting and notice requirements. Some of that is already laid out for us in statute. We're gonna start working with our customers on that right away to understand what we are required to communicate about Virginia paid family and medical leap to the workforce. And we could be building the operations for how that's gonna look right now. Are we are we communicating in our handbooks? Are we communicating through LMS systems? Are we communicating, are we, you know, putting notes on timesheets? We've done some really uh excuse me, we've done some really creative things in other states to meet the obligations of that state's posting requirements and um excited to to you know be at it again in Virginia. Um, we will all need to work to understand the financial impact that this new law is going to have to our organizations. And really, again, the key piece we need for that is the contribution rate. We need to know what that contribution rate is going to be to assess the impact to our organization. At this point, though, I will say we can take some good educated guesses. We have a lot of states around us that have established paid family and medical leave programs. We've got some newer states in other parts of the country that have established in the last few years, and everybody's tracking towards the same-ish contribution rates. So we can make some educated guesses there. Another big to-do is updating our policies to indicate how Virginia Paid Family and Medical Leave is going to integrate with our existing leave of absence and time-off plans. And that and that is really like operationalizing and building the policy around Virginia Paid Family and Medical Leave. Those are the things we can start doing right now. And the more time you spend doing that up front, the more confident you are going to be in getting to uh you know April or December of 2028 with a really you know confident feel that you know what's going on, you know how your programs are impacted, you know how you're going to do things like uh issue supplemental payments if somebody's only getting 80% of their income through Virginia Paid Family and Medical Leave. How do we operationalize getting them that extra 20% of their pay if that's something we're all in agreement that's going to happen? Um, and and so that is where I think a lot could be happening right now to prepare. Um and things that we will already begin working with our customers on. I love it. And I think I think that's a wrap for me. That's probably enough.

SPEAKER_00 14:30

I feel I feel like this is like enough for the next three months. So Bracey and I are just gonna take another couple months off here. And Brycey, I'm really glad that you talked a little bit about the um like the the timeline of this Virginia program. Um, I think that we all feel it's a little tight. I also feel like having benefits available beginning December one is an odd start date. It's just, it's just weird. I mean, we don't always have January one. We just saw Maine do it with May one. Um, but having a December one availability date for benefits, again, we're looking at 2028, is a little makes them a little bit more unique, that's for sure. So yes, we're gonna be following all of this. We love it. All right. Well, I am gonna transition us to a few more things, paid family and medical leave related. But Brycey, maybe so we can have another, and I'll make my guesses too, so we can do I told you so to each other. But if we could have another I told you so moment, and we did not rehearse for this, do we want to make any predictions on what the next couple states are? So let's recap. We've got Maryland on deck, then we've got Virginia after that that are gonna go live with paid mandatory paid family and medical leave programs. What are some of our guesses as far as other states that may go live after these two or may enact a program whether?

SPEAKER_01 15:49

Yeah, I don't know. I I I will say I I I continue to gun for New Mexico. They've tried it so many times and and just can't quite get it done. So I I would love it for the for the proponents in that state to find some success.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

That was gonna be mine, and then Illinois was gonna be my other one, just because Illinois passed a flurry of very employee-friendly leave laws this state. Um, they have some expanded protections uh for NICU-related leave. They have some expanded protections for military-related leave. I want to say there were three or four different leave laws, again, employee-friendly ones that they passed this year. So that's another state that's on my radar. So we're gonna revisit this to see if we can have another I Told You moment. We've probably got a little bit of a runway um to see if either of those two predictions come through, come through. Um, so let's let's talk about some updates. I'm just gonna go through this like pretty quickly, but let's give you all some updates on existing um paid family and medical leave programs, uh, particularly with regards to some of the week uh maximum weekly benefits. Um, for those clients that are listening, you've probably already gotten some communication from us um on this information. We're also going to be talking about it in our next newsletter. But for those newer listeners, we are super excited to break this news for you. So, real like cutting-edge journalism that we're bringing your way, but a few states to talk about. So um Colorado, Oregon, Maine, and Rhode Island, they all have increases to their maximum weekly benefits for paid family and medical leave that are effective July 1, 2026. And I'm not gonna go through all the numbers. I feel like that's a little bit too much for everything that we've covered so far. But the one thing that I want you to keep in mind is um Colorado does things a little bit more uniquely when it comes to applications of this new maximum weekly benefit. So what Colorado does is they make changes or changes apply to all new and open claim payments made on or after July 1, 2026. Contrast that to our friends in Oregon and Maine, the the changes to the maximum weekly benefit are only applying to new claims submitted on or after it's either late June or early July, depending upon which one of those two states that you're in. So it's a little bit different approach. So what this means is that in-flight claims in Colorado, so those claims that started prior to July 1 and carry over post-July 1, those existing in-flight claims could actually have an increase in maximum weekly benefits. As you can see, states put together these rules, like whichever way the breeze blows. I mean, that's really what it seems like, because we don't have consistency from state to state, but it's why it's so important to understand some of these different nuances, particularly if you are supplementing wages. Because again, those in-flight claims in Colorado, you're gonna have a change from the supplementation amount the last part of um June into the first part of July. So keep that in mind. If you're interested in any of the specific numbers, you can email Bryce or I. We will absolutely get you that information. Increases to the maximum weekly benefit are something that occurs most frequently on an annualized basis. Almost all the programs increase their maximum weekly benefit on an annualized basis. It's typically like a negligible amount. Um, I would say generally like less than $100. I shouldn't say that's negligible, but less than $100 is on average what we're gonna see. And it's driven by adjustments to the state average weekly wage, which again is an adjustment that is made on an annualized basis. For some of our other states, um we see changes to these benefits amount happen January 1. But like I said, we've got three these four states that are all gonna be happening July one. So please keep that in mind. And then I want to round you out with an update from the Jersey Shore, if you will. I don't know if you're of a certain age. Um, I don't want to claim that I actually like spent very much time watching this show, but if you did ever watch the Jersey Shore, you're familiar with GTL, which I think is Gym Tan Laundry. That's not what we are gonna be talking about today. But what I do want to tell you about is some significant law expansions um in the state of New Jersey that are going to be effective July 17th. Yes, July 17th. I had to sneak at my notes real quick. So it's coming up very quickly, and these impact not only temporary disability and paid family leave, but we also have some adjustments to New Jersey Family Leave Act, which is the unpaid job protected leave law that New Jersey has for its employees. So, first big change um temporary disability insurance and family leave insurance is now explicitly job protected. So in the state of New Jersey, it wasn't previously explicitly job protected. I feel like this is kind of an insignificant change simply because a lot of times if these programs don't offer explicit job protection, they still have very strong anti-retaliation language. And so even when we don't have job protection in place because they have the anti-retaliation language, you're still going to hear Brycey and I say, hey, you should still treat this as a job protected leave if your employee is accessing this benefit type. So again, in July, the New Jersey family leave and disability insurance do come with job protection. So that is a way apparently that they are going to celebrate America's 250th birthday by providing job protection there. And then the other big one is New Jersey Family Leave Act. Again, that's the Unpaid, it's like New Jersey's own version of FMLA. The way that that policy is currently put together, or or um, what the legislation currently states is that eligible employees get up to 12 weeks of unpaid job protection in a 24-month period. For anyone who operates in New Jersey, I think you know that figuring out that entitlement over a 24-month period is very difficult because pretty much everyone else is 12 months, but that's neither here nor there. So eligibility for that program historically, or rather until mid-July, is employees can take that leave if they work for an employer who employs at least 30 employees and they've been employed for at least 12 months and have worked a thousand base hours in that preceding 12-month period. New Jersey, effective July 17th, it is going to expand coverage to smaller employers with fewer employees, and it's also going to lower the number of months that an employee must be employed to be eligible. So the definition of an employer, I previously said it's 30 employees. The definition of employer is now going to be 15 or more employees for each work week during each of the 20 or more calendar work weeks in the then current or immediately preceding calendar year. Yes, I am cheating with some notes there. So please bear with me. But that number's being cut in half. So we're going from 30 to 15 employees for employer coverage. And then for employees to be eligible, they need only three months worked and 250 hours worked during the preceding base period. So what New Jersey has done, and again, we always love to contrast this to what we see in other states, is New Jersey has now given us the lowest threshold for eligibility for New Jersey's version of FMLA. Previously, that award, and I don't know if it's an award, but it went to Oregon. So Oregon currently has eligibility of their Oregon Family Leave Act program of 180 calendar days and 25 hours worked per week. We have significantly lower in New Jersey right now. So sorry, Oregon, there's a new queen in town. It's New Jersey. I'm sure Oregon and California are now going to want to try and jump on these bandwagons and being trying to change their own leave laws to lower the eligibility threshold, but we'll see what happens. So those are the biggies happening out of um New Jersey. The other thing that I think is really important to talk about in New Jersey, and this one, I will tell you, um, we actually like we did a phone a friend on. We engaged counsel on some interpretation here because we were a little bit, we were struggling a little bit in how to interpretate this. So the new law, um, what it is allowing employees to do, again, this is the middle of July, is that employees have the option to use New Jersey earned sick leave. So New Jersey has regulatory paid sick leave or receiving TDI or family leave benefits and control the order of such use. Okay, so again, this is unprecedented. Let's let's unpack this a little bit. So, what this means, your employees in New Jersey, they can tell you, hey, for my first week of leave, I just want to use my regulatory paid sick leave. I am not going to apply for temporary disability or family leave, depending upon what the leave circumstance is, or vice versa. They could say, I'm gonna use TDI or FLI, I want to save my New Jersey, earn sick leave for a rainy day or other qualified such reasons. And part two of this is employees cannot receive more than one kind of paid leave simultaneously during the leave period. And this is where Brycey and I said, wait a second, does this mean that an employee could not supplement their TDI or family leave benefits with available regulatory paid sick leave that they have from the state of New Jersey? And the interpretation is that is is yes, employees are no longer able, and I'm using the word interpretation because I don't think this is the intent of the law, but this is how it's written. Employees are no longer able to supplement their TDI or family leave benefits with their available sick. Um the way that this amendment is written, and it's our interpretation, and we've gotten counsel interpretation as well, is that it actually prohibits the use of those two leave types being applied at the same time. Um again, I don't think this is the intent of the law. This is a very squishy topic. I I think that New Jersey probably wants employees to have the ability to access 100% of their wages between a combination of the two when they're off of work for a qualified reason, but that's not how the amendment was written. So we're kind of watching this. We know that we've there some of you listening have a very heavy population in New Jersey. We've had some really robust conversation with our client base about what this looks like, but it is it is a biggie. So just some like light, light content to drop on your day. This was a lot, Brycey.

SPEAKER_01 27:39

Is it yeah, it was a big one. It was a technical one. Um, so thanks for thanks for those who stuck with us to the end here. Um, and I am gonna drop just a fun challenge to our audience and and to Christine and our marketing team. And thank you in advance for being good sports. But we uh we want to figure out a way between now and and maybe the next time we record to to get some feedback from the audience on, you know, we've had several episodes that we've released. I'd love to know what's resonating and really what you want to hear about in the space of leave and accommodation. The world is our oyster. There's so many things we could be discussing in this format. And so um we're gonna put our heads together and figure out a way to get your input on on what you want us to be talking about next. I know we've done a lot of a lot of paid family and medical leave is a favorite topic of ours and always keeps us uh busy and and armed with new content. We've done some kind of FMLA ADA 101, we've done some relevant case law, um, but uh very interested to know what you, the people, would like to hear from us.

SPEAKER_00 28:44

Yeah. Thanks everyone for tuning in. Happy summer 2026. The information provided in this podcast is for general information and education purposes only. It's not intended to be and should not be construed as legal, financial, or human resources advice. While we strive to provide accurate and up-to-date information, laws and policies regarding leave management vary by jurisdiction and may change over time. Listeners should consult with a qualified attorney, HR professional, or relevant expert for advice specific to their situation. The views and opinions expressed by the hosts and guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of their employers or any affiliated organizations.