FMLA - Minnesota

Parental Leave Law

Effective July 1, 2023, Minnesota's Parental Leave Law applies to employers with one or more employee.

Paid family and medical leave (effective 1/1/2026)

All employers are covered by this law.

Employers may use the state program, or apply to the commissioner for approval to meet their obligations through the substitution of a private plan that provides paid family, paid medical, or paid family and medical benefits.

The program will be funded through employer and employee contributions which also begin on January 1, 2026.

Employee eligibility

Employees must have earned at least 5.3 percent of the state average annual wage in total over the base period (a designated 12-month period prior to the start of leave). Seasonal employees are not covered.

Income earned from all covered Minnesota employers in the base period counts toward the total.

• Employees must spend 50 percent or more of the employment during the calendar year in Minnesota; OR
• If 50 percent or more of the employment during the calendar year is not performed in Minnesota or any other US state, or territory or foreign nation, they must perform some of the employment in Minnesota and the employee's residence is in Minnesota during 50 percent or more of the calendar year.

Employees are not eligible for the leave if they are incarcerated or receiving or received unemployment benefits.

Leave entitlement

The leave is broken into two categories:

• Medical leave, including for pregnancy or recovery from childbirth, and
• All other reasons for leave (bonding, safety leave, caregiving leave, and military family leave).

Employees can receive up to 12 weeks of leave in each of the two categories per benefit year.

Intermittent leave must be taken in increments consistent with the established employer policy to account for use of other forms of leave, so long as such employer's policy permits a minimum increment of at most one calendar day of intermittent leave.

Employees may not apply for payment for benefits associated with intermittent leave until they have eight hours of accumulated leave time, unless more than 30 calendar days have lapsed since the initial taking of the leave.

Employee authorized representatives may apply for leave on the employee's behalf.

Employees who need leave from both categories can take up to 20 weeks total in a benefit year.

Employers are required to notify employees of their benefit year within 30 days of the private plan approval and first day of employment.

Employers may give employees supplemental wage replacement during an absence, but if the total amount of paid benefits and supplemental benefits paid exceed the employee’s usual salary, the employee must refund the excess to the employer or the paid leave division.

Qualifying reasons

• The employee’s own serious health condition (including pregnancy).
• To bond with a child (birth, adoption, or foster care).
• To care for a family member with a serious health condition.
• Due to a family member’s military service.
• To deal with issues related to domestic abuse, sexual assault, or stalking of the employee or family member.

Family members:

• A spouse or domestic partner;
• A child, including a biological, adopted, or foster child, a stepchild, a child of a domestic partner, or a child to whom the employee stands in loco parentis, is a legal guardian, or is a de facto custodian;
• A parent or legal guardian of the employee (the biological, adoptive, de facto custodian, or foster parent, stepparent, or legal guardian of an employee or the employee’s spouse, or an individual who stood in loco parentis to an employee when the employee was a child);
• A sibling;
• A grandchild (a child of the employee’s child);
• A grandparent or spouse's grandparent (means a parent of the employee’s parent);
• A son-in-law or daughter-in-law; and
• An individual who has a personal relationship with the employee that creates an expectation and reliance that the employee care for the individual without compensation, whether or not the employee and the individual reside together.

Reinstatement

Employees who have worked for the employer for at least 90 calendar days are entitled to be reinstated.

Employees must be returned to the same position the employee held when leave commenced or to an equivalent position with equivalent benefits, pay, and other terms and conditions of employment.

Concurrency with federal FMLA

If the employee meets the eligibility criteria for both state and federal FMLA, and the reason qualifies for both, the leave may run concurrently.

Notices/forms

If the need for leave is foreseeable, employees must provide at least 30 days' advance notice before leave is to begin. Authorized representatives may apply for leave on an employee’s behalf.

If 30 days' notice is not practicable because of a lack of knowledge of approximately when leave will be required to begin, a change in circumstances, or a medical emergency, notice must be given as soon as practicable.

Employees must include certification supporting a request for leave, which will be given to the state Department of Employment and Economic Development.

Employers must post in a conspicuous place on each of its premises a notice of benefits available under this law.

Employers must notify employees of their benefit year within 30 days of the private plan approval and first day of employment.

School conference and activities leave

Employers must grant employees leave of up to a total of 16 unpaid hours during any 12-month period to attend school conferences or school-related activities related to the employee’s child, provided the conferences or school-related activities cannot be scheduled during non-work hours. When the leave cannot be scheduled during non-work hours and the need for the leave is foreseeable, the employee must provide reasonable prior notice of the leave and make a reasonable effort to schedule the leave so as not to disrupt unduly the operations of the employer.

Bone marrow donation leave

Employers with 20 or more employees must allow employees to take up to 40 hours of paid leave to donate bone marrow. Employees are those who work an average of at least 20 hours per week. The law does not include other employee eligibility criteria.

The employer may require employees to provide physician verification regarding the purpose and length of the leave. If there is medical determination that the employee does not qualify as a bone marrow donor, the paid leave is not forfeited.

Employers are prohibited from retaliating against employees for exercising their rights under this law.

Organ donation leave

Public employers with 20 or more employees must grant paid leaves of up to 40 hours for each absence to an employee who seeks to undergo a medical procedure to donate an organ or partial organ to another person.

The employer may require verification by a physician supporting the purpose and length of each leave. If there is a medical determination that the employee does not qualify as an organ donor, the paid leave of absence granted to the employee prior to that medical determination is not forfeited.

Employers are prohibited from retaliating against an employee for requesting or obtaining a leave of absence.

Blood donation leave

State employees must be granted up to three hours’ paid leave within a 12-month period to donate blood at a location away from the place of work.

Employees must provide 14 days' notice.

This leave must not affect the employee's vacation leave, pension, compensatory time, personal vacation days, sick leave, earned overtime accumulation, or cause a loss of seniority.

“State employee” does not include an employee of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities.

Civil Air Patrol leave

Unless the leave would unduly disrupt the operations of the employer, employers with 20 or more employees must allow employees to take unpaid leave for time spent rendering service as a member of the Civil Air Patrol on the request and under the authority of the state or any of its political subdivisions.

Employees are those who work an average of at least 20 hours per week. The law does not include other employee eligibility criteria.

Military family leave

Employers must grant up to 10 days of unpaid leave to an employee whose immediate family member, as a member of the United States Armed Forces, was injured or killed while engaged in active service.

Employees must give as much notice as practicable of the intent to take leave.

The length of military family leave provided may be reduced by any period of paid leave provided by the employer.

Unless the leave would unduly disrupt operations, an employer must grant unpaid leave to an employee whose immediate family member, as a member of the United States Armed Forces, has been ordered into active service in support of a war or other national emergency.

The employer may limit the amount of leave to the actual time necessary for the employee to attend a send-off or homecoming ceremony for the mobilized service member, not to exceed one day's duration in any calendar year.

“Immediate family member” means a person's grandparent, parent, legal guardian, sibling, child, grandchild, spouse, or fiancé.

Domestic abuse

Although not a true leave provision, employers are prohibited from penalizing an employee for taking reasonable time off from work to obtain or attempt to obtain relief. Unless not practicable, employees are to give at least 48 hours’ advance notice of the need for leave. They are also to provide verifications supporting the reason for the absence.

The law does not provide a definition of what is considered “reasonable time off.”

Victims/witnesses

Although not a true leave provision, employers must allow a victim or witness to attend court and time off to attend criminal proceedings. Like the domestic abuse provisions, unless impracticable, employees are to provide at least 48 hours’ notice of the need for leave. Employees are also to provide verification supporting the employee’s reason for the absence.

Sick and Safe Leave (until 1/1/2024)

If an employer provides sick leave, employees are entitled to use that sick leave for absences due to an illness or injury of the employee’s child, spouse, sibling, parent, grandparent, grandchild, mother-in-law, father-in-law, or stepparent. The absences are to be provided on the same terms upon which the employee is able to use sick leave for his or her own illness or injury.

Employees may use sick leave for safety leave, which is for helping the employee or family members because of sexual assault, domestic abuse, or stalking.

Employers may limit the use of personal sick leave for these reasons (except for the illness/injury of a child) to no less than 160 hours in any 12-month period.

For purposes of this law, “child” includes a biological, step, adopted, and foster child.

Earned Sick and Safe Time (Effective 1/1/2024)

All employers with one or more employees are covered by the MN Earned Sick and Safe Time (ESST) law.

Employee eligibility

To be eligible, employees must work or be anticipated to work at least 80 hours in a year for an employer in Minnesota; and not be an independent contractor, firefighter, elected official or farm employee.

Temporary and part-time employees are eligible for sick and safe time.

The provisions may be waived by a collective bargaining agreement with a bona fide building and construction trades labor organization provided that the waiver explicitly reference the law (§§181.9445 to 181.9448) and clearly and unambiguously waives application of those sections to those employees.

Leave entitlement

Employees earn one hour of paid sick and safe time for every 30 hours worked and can earn a maximum of 48 hours each year unless the employer agrees to a higher amount.

Employees may carry over any unused leave from year to year, but the employer may cap the number of hours accrued at 80.

Employees may use ESST leave in the same increment of time for which employees are paid, provided the employer is not required to provide leave in less than 15-minute increments. Employers may not require use of earned sick and safe time in more than four-hour increments.

Employers may provide employees with earned sick and safe time for the year that is available for the employee's immediate use at the beginning of the subsequent year as follows:

• 48 hours, if an employer pays an employee for accrued but unused sick and safe time at the end of a year at the same hourly rate as an employee earns from employment; or
• 80 hours, if an employer does not pay an employee for accrued but unused sick and safe time at the end of a year at the same or greater hourly rate as an employee earns from employment.

Employers determine the 12-month leave year period and must clearly communicate it to each employee.

Employees rehired within 180 days are entitled to have their previously unused accrued earned sick and safe time reinstated. Employees may begin using the leave and accrue additional leave at the time of rehire.

Qualifying reasons

Employees may use their earned sick and safe time for any of the following reasons:

• The employee’s mental or physical illness, treatment, or preventive care;
• A family member’s mental or physical illness, treatment, or preventive care;
• Absence due to domestic abuse, sexual assault or stalking of the employee or a family member;
• Closure of the employee’s workplace due to weather or public emergency or closure of a family member’s school or care facility due to weather or public emergency (with some exceptions);
• To make arrangements for or attend funeral services or a memorial or address financial or legal matters that arise after the death of a family member; and
• When determined by a health authority or health care professional that the employee or family member is at risk of infecting others with a communicable disease.

Family members

• Child, including foster child, adult child, legal ward, child for whom the employee is legal guardian or child to whom the employee stands or stood in loco parentis (in place of a parent);
• Spouse or registered domestic partner;
• Sibling, stepsibling, or foster sibling;
• Biological, adoptive, or foster parent, stepparent or a person who stood in loco parentis (in place of a parent) when the employee was a minor child;
• Grandchild, foster grandchild or step-grandchild;
• Grandparent or step-grandparent;
• A child of a sibling of the employee;
• A sibling of the parents of the employee;
• A child-in-law or sibling-in-law;
• Any of the family members listed in above of an employee’s spouse or registered domestic partner;
• Any other individual related by blood or whose close association with the employee is the equivalent of a family relationship; and
• Up to one individual annually designated by the employee.

Reinstatement

Employees are entitled to reinstatement of employment at the same rate of pay received when the leave began, plus any automatic adjustments in the employee’s pay scale that occurred during the leave period.

Concurrency with federal FMLA

If an employee meets the eligibility criteria for both and the reason qualifies for both, leave under both may run concurrently.

Notices/forms

If the need for leave is foreseeable, employers may require up to seven days’ advance notice. If the need is unforeseeable, employers may require notice of the need for leave as soon as practicable.

Employers may require reasonable documentation regarding the need for leave when an employee uses it for more than three days in a row.

For domestic abuse, sexual assault or stalking, if documentation cannot be obtained in a reasonable time or without added expense, then reasonable documentation may include a written statement from the employee indicating that the employee is using or used earned sick and safe time for the qualifying reason.

Employers must, at the end of each pay period, provide information on each employee's amount of:

• The total number of ESST hours available for use, and
• The total number of ESST hours used during the pay period.