Assemblyman Joe Sempolinski is pictured introducing a group of St. Bonaventure University HEOP students on the floor of the Assembly in March. The students were in the Capitol for Student Advocacy Day organized by the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities.

State lawmakers are eyeing an expansion of the state’s Paid Family Leave law to include qualifying construction workers.

The legislation (A.4727) recently passed the state Assembly by a 138-10 vote with Assemblymen Andrew Molitor, R-Westfield, and Joe Sempolinski, R-Olean, both voting against the measure. Sempolinski said on the Assembly floor that sponsor Harry Bronson, D-Rochester, is trying to solve a problem with the state’s Paid Family Leave program but questions if Bronson’s fix will work for businesses.

“If we as a state have decided that we should be giving Paid Family Leave, I think these folks do deserve an opportunity to get into that program,” Sempolinski said. “So the move from employer to employer with gaps, I totally concur that is a problem. My issue is with the secondary part, where you could have a situation where someone hires an employee and that employee has never worked at all for that particular employer, has worked previously 26 out of 39 weeks for other employers, and then they get hired after a leave of absence and now they can immediately accrue benefits.”

Bronson wrote in his legislative justification that existing law makes it difficult for construction workers to use the Paid Family Leave Act because they often don’t work for a particular employer long enough to qualify. If they do work the required 26 weeks and qualify for benefits they lose the benefits once they are laid off and then have to work another 26 weeks to qualify.

The Rochester Democrat proposes to allow workers who are employed by more than one employer in the field

of construction, excavation, rehabilitation, repairs, reconstruction, renovations, alterations, and improvements to become eligible for Paid Family Leave benefits as long as they are employed for 26 of the last 39 weeks with a covered employer. Once eligible, construction workers would remain eligible if they return to work with the

same or different covered employer after an agreed and specified unpaid leave of absence or they return to work with the same or different covered employer after a lay-off, provided they had worked at least 26 of the last 39 weeks.

Republicans had concerns that A.4727 will hurt employers. Bronson argued against that criticism.

“(We’re dealing with) a specific industry that because of the reality of that industry, we want to make sure that individuals qualify for the benefit remembering that this benefit is paid by the employee but their payment that they’re going to receive comes through an insurance coverage, so this really is not going to harm employers in any way,” Bronson said. “Certainly these particular employers are all signatories to a collective bargaining agreement that anticipate how they’re going to handle this for the employees, so there is no harm to the employer. There is a benefit to the employee so that they like all other folks would be able to have paid family leave whether it’s to bond with a child take care of an ill family member or all the other criteria where we want families to be able to balance work and life and taking care of their families.”