Responding to worker concerns for greater work/life balance, public policy-makers have, among other initiatives, pushed for new laws over the last decade or so designed to protect the right of employees who are nursing mothers to take break time to express breast milk and be provided with a private space in which to do so.
In 2010, for example, the U.S. Congress amended the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) to require employers to provide eligible nonexempt employees reasonable break time to express breast milk for up to one year after the child’s birth, and the Department of Labor issued detailed guidance on the new requirement later that year. In addition, under revised enforcement guidance issued by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), because lactation is a pregnancy-related medical condition, less favorable treatment of a lactating employee may raise an inference of discrimination under the Pregnancy Discrimination Act.
A number of states and localities also have enacted lactation protection laws, including California way back in 2001. And although California’s law provides protection to employees working anywhere in the state, the City of San Francisco recently adopted its own ordinance, effective January 1, 2018, imposing requirements that go beyond either state or federal law.
Among other things, the ordinance sets minimum standards for the size of the lactation space that must be provided and features that must be included. It also requires employers to establish and disseminate a lactation accommodation policy and process for employees to request an accommodation.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.