Oakland Paid Sick Leave law  

Sick Leave Employees must accrue at least one hour of sick leave for every 30 hours worked within the geographic limits of Oakland. Employees begin accruing paid sick leave on their first day of work and may start using sick leave after 90 calendar days of employment. State and local laws permit employers to place certain accrual caps on hours. An employee’s accrued sick leave must carry over from year to year. Employees may use any portion of their sick leave to care for their own health or to aid or care for a family member or designated person. OMC § 5.92.030. 

 5.92.030. Oakland Paid Sick Leave.  

Latest version. 

Accrual of Paid Sick Leave. 

Paid Sick Leave shall begin to accrue as of the 2nd of March 2015. For Employees hired by an Employer after March 2, 2015, the Employee shall not be entitled to use Paid Sick Leave until after 90 calendar days of employment with the Employer. 

For every 30 hours worked after Paid Sick Leave begins to accrue for an Employee, the Employee shall accrue one (1) hour of Paid Sick Leave. Such leave shall accrue only in hour-unit increments; there shall be no accrual of a fraction of an hour of such leave. 

For Employees of Small Businesses, there shall be a cap of forty (40) hours of accrued Paid Sick Leave. For Employees of other Employers, there shall be a cap of seventy-two (72) hours of accrued Paid Sick Leave. Accrued Paid Sick Leave for Employees carries over from year to year (whether calendar year or fiscal year), but is limited to the aforementioned cap. Nothing herein precludes an Employer from establishing a higher cap or no cap on the number of accrued hours. 

If an Employer has a paid leave policy, such as a paid time off policy, that makes available to Employees an amount of paid leave that may be used for the same purposes as Paid Sick Leave under this Chapter and that is sufficient to meet the requirements for accrued Paid Sick Leave as stated in subsections (a)-(c), the Employer is not required to provide additional Paid Sick Leave.  

An Employer is not required to provide financial or other reimbursement to an Employee upon the Employee's termination, resignation, retirement, or other separation from employment, for accrued Paid Sick Leave that the Employee has not used. 

Use of Paid Sick Leave. 

An Employee may use Paid Sick Leave not only when he or she is ill or injured or for the purpose of the Employee's receiving medical care, treatment, or diagnosis, as specified more fully in California Labor Code § 233(b)(4), but also to aid or care for the following persons when they are ill or injured or receiving medical care, treatment, or diagnosis: Child; parent; legal guardian or ward; sibling; grandparent; grandchild; and spouse, registered domestic partner under any state or local law, or designated person. The Employee may use all or any percentage of his or her Paid Sick Leave to aid or care for the persons. The child, parent, sibling, grandparent, and grandchild relationships include not only biological relationships but also relationships resulting from adoption; step-relationships; and foster care relationships. "Child" includes the child of a domestic partner and a child of a person standing in loco parentis. If the Employee has no spouse or registered domestic partner, the Employee may designate one (1) person as to whom the Employee may use paid sick leave to aid or care for that person in lieu of a spouse or registered domestic partner. The opportunity to make such a decision shall be extended to the Employee no later than the date on which the Employee has worked thirty (30) hours after Paid Sick Leave begins to accrue pursuant to this Chapter. There shall be a window of ten (10) workdays for the Employee to make this designation. Thereafter, the opportunity to make such a designation, including the opportunity to change such a designation previously made, shall be extended to the Employee on an annual basis, with a window of ten (10) workdays for the Employee to make the designation. 

An Employer may not require, as a condition of an Employee's taking Paid Sick Leave, that the Employee search for or find a replacement worker to cover the hours during which the Employee is on Paid Sick Leave.  

An Employer may require Employees to give reasonable notification of an absence from work for which Paid Sick Leave is or will be used. 

An Employer may only take reasonable measures to verify or document that an Employee's use of Paid Sick Leave is lawful and shall not require an Employee to incur expenses more than five ($5.00) dollars to show his or her eligibility for such paid leave.