[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 92 (Thursday, June 20, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1123]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         INTRODUCTION OF THE PARENTAL LEAVE EQUITY ACT OF 1996

                                 ______


                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 19, 1996

  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today, I introduce the Parental Family Leave 
Act of 1996, a bill which will ensure that employees who choose to care 
for a foster child or adopt a child will benefit from the same leave 
policy as their coworkers who are birth parents. This bill does not 
mandate that employers provide leave benefits beyond existing law, but 
rather that if they choose to provide such benefits, they do so for all 
parents equitably. Because the employers involved are generally larger 
businesses and the number of children is small, the bill will not 
burden employers.
  The Family Medical Leave Act of 1993 [FMLA] provides that employers 
must grant up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave for adoptive, 
birth and foster parents to care for a new child. Although some 
employers go beyond the mandate of the act and provide paid leave or 
allow paid sick leave to be used by employees with a new child, they 
often extend these benefits only to birth parents and not to foster 
parents or parents who adopt. My bill tracks the FMLA, correcting this 
inequity by providing that if an employer allows additional leave 
benefits for the birth of a child, the employer shall provide the same 
leave benefits to parents of a foster child or an adopted child. Thus, 
my bill does not require employers to provide leave policies beyond the 
requirement of the FMLA, but provides only for equal treatment for 
adoptive and foster parents, in keeping with the intent of the original 
legislation.
  The basis for granting parental leave to both foster and adoptive 
parents overlap, but the circumstances of foster parents and adoptive 
parents are often different. Foster children are generally older 
children who have been removed from their own homes. Often they are 
children with specific needs. Sometimes they have been abused. Thus, a 
foster parent will normally have a greater challenge of adjustment than 
a new birth parent. A foster parent must acclimate to a child who 
already has set habits and personality traits. The foster child is 
sometimes intimidated by being thrust into her new surroundings. She 
may have come from dangerous or perhaps life threatening circumstances. 
In addition, foster care systems, especially those in large cities, are 
in great disrepair. A recent GAO report reported disgraceful 
circumstances for the care of many of these youngsters, a situation 
that is pervasive throughout the United States. The wreckage left 
behind by failed foster care systems is often reflected in the lives of 
foster children. They clearly need their parents in their new home as 
much, and probably more than the newborns who are the major recipients 
of paid leave.
  Adopted children are generally not as old as foster care children and 
do not generally come to their new families from troubled 
circumstances. However, because most adoptive parents are caring for an 
infant, they find themselves in a situation similar to the parents of 
newborns. There is no reason, therefore, to treat them differently than 
birth parents.
  There are few foster or adoptive parents in any single workplace, 
guaranteeing that the effects on the employer would be minuscule in 
keeping with the policy of the FLMA. I urge my colleagues to support 
this bill to help ensure that foster parents and adoptive parents 
receive the same opportunity as birth parents to bond with a new child 
and to acclimate that child to her new family and surroundings.

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