Private breast-pumping rooms required at work in California starting Jan. 1

Sacramento Bee ^ | December 31, 2019 | Wes Venteicher

[artichokegrower]

California employers, including state departments, must provide private rooms for women to express breast milk in the workplace starting Wednesday.

[BipolarBob]

Equality under Title IX requires masturbation rooms for the men to compensate for this biased privilege.

[sergeantdave]

Every conservative man should demand a private workplace room to express breast milk.

Remember, overwhelm the fraudulent fascist system with ridiculous demands.

[MayflowerMadam]

Those are funny!

I believe the beginning of the end for me was when, at a staff meeting when the HR Director announced her plan for the Lactation Room, I rolled my eyes. It didn’t go unnoticed.

[Mr Rogers]

CHAPTER 3.8. Lactation Accommodation [1030 - 1034] ( Chapter 3.8 added by Stats. 2001, Ch. 821, Sec. 1. )

1030.

Every employer, including the state and any political subdivision, shall provide a reasonable amount of break time to accommodate an employee desiring to express breast milk for the employee’s infant child each time the employee has need to express milk. The break time shall, if possible, run concurrently with any break time already provided to the employee. Break time for an employee that does not run concurrently with the rest time authorized for the employee by the applicable wage order of the Industrial Welfare Commission shall be unpaid.

(Amended by Stats. 2019, Ch. 720, Sec. 1. (SB 142) Effective January 1, 2020.)

1031.

(a) An employer shall provide an employee with the use of a room or other location for the employee to express milk in private. The room or location may include the place where the employee normally works if it otherwise meets the requirements of this section.

(b) A lactation room or location shall not be a bathroom and shall be in close proximity to the employee’s work area, shielded from view, and free from intrusion while the employee is expressing milk.

(c) A lactation room or location shall comply with all of the following requirements:

(1) Be safe, clean, and free of hazardous materials, as defined in Section 6382.

(2) Contain a surface to place a breast pump and personal items.

(3) Contain a place to sit.

(4) Have access to electricity or alternative devices, including, but not limited to, extension cords or charging stations, needed to operate an electric or battery-powered breast pump.

(d) The employer shall provide access to a sink with running water and a refrigerator suitable for storing milk in close proximity to the employee’s workspace. If a refrigerator cannot be provided, an employer may provide another cooling device suitable for storing milk, such as an employer-provided cooler.

(e) Where a multipurpose room is used for lactation, among other uses, the use of the room for lactation shall take precedence over the other uses, but only for the time it is in use for lactation purposes.

(f) (1) An employer in a multitenant building or multiemployer worksite may comply with this section by providing a space shared among multiple employers within the building or worksite if the employer cannot provide a lactation location within the employer’s own workspace.

(2) Employers or general contractors coordinating a multiemployer worksite shall either provide lactation accommodations or provide a safe and secure location for a subcontractor employer to provide lactation accommodations on the worksite, within two business days, upon written request of any subcontractor employer with an employee that requests an accommodation.

It goes into even more detail, find the law here:

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?sectionNum=1031.&lawCode=LAB

Don’t see many exceptions there...

And there is this:

“On the federal level, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) provides that, for up to one year after a child’s birth, a nursing mother must be provided a “reasonable break time” to express milk “each time such employee has need to express the milk.” These breaks may be unpaid. You must also provide a private place for expressing milk, other than a bathroom, that is shielded from view and free from intrusion. Further, in 2015, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) officially adopted the position that lactation is protected by the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA). Accordingly, failure to allow for time to express breastmilk could result not only in FLSA violations, but also a discrimination lawsuit under the PDA. “

https://www.fisherphillips.com/california-employers-blog/california-makes-sweeping-changes-to-lactation-accommodation

[wally_bert]

Dilbert is often the truth regarding the idiocy that runs rampant in the workplace.

A few months ago I had to help a visiting European engineer with his laptop. When he took a seat at my desk and saw the Dilbert calendar, he exclaimed “Truth!”

The office secret Santa apparently knows me well. I got next year’s calendar a few days before I routinely order.

[Don W]

Granted women’s restrooms are several orders of magnitude filthier than men’s rooms, but one would think that the mother(s) involved would keep the room somewhat cleaner than is the typical for “ladies’ rooms”.

Also, putting a swollen breast’s nipple in a baby’s mouth is quite different from opening up packages, spreading it out over a frypan, then putting it onto a plate, is it not?

[mumblypeg]

Or the trannies will insist on “access” so as not to be trated as if they’re different.
Both trans “women” (so they can watch) and trans “men” because they’re actually women who really can lactate
Think about it.

[NobleFree]

I think one of the major contributors to the degradation of society is so many mothers leaving their children in daycare. You can’t have it all, something’s gotta give and it’s usually the children’s well-being.

A woman I know told the story of how, when her maternity leave for her youngest had ended and she was headed back to work, her 3(?)-year-old screamed and wet his pants. She told it for laughs ... my heart broke for that boy. He didn't want their big house in the burbs - he wanted his mother.

[ImJustAnotherOkie]

We added some at my work. They didn’t add the viewing window option.

[TaMoDee]

Breast pumping room: Is this the “closet” where our draftsman takes the ‘dollie’ tech writer for a pumping?

[MayflowerMadam]

“When he took a seat at my desk and saw the Dilbert calendar, he exclaimed ‘Truth!’”

I never decided which was more truthful or relevant when I worked in HR — Dilbert cartoons or the “Despair” posters. (My boss was not a fan of them and they were banned from the office.)

[762X51]

must provide private rooms for women

Well that's not very inclusive. If they're putting tampons in the men's restrooms then surely these same men may need to pump their breasts.

[llevrok]

Ping for later

[erkelly]

It seems motherhood, and a new baby, is just a minor event in a woman’s life these days. How very sad for these new mothers that they are not at home, cuddling and playing with their babies as they nurse. I think this mother-child bonding that takes place during these times is far more important than mother’s milk, important as that is.

[bigbob]

Do they hire attendants? Equal opportunity and all.

[lastchance]

It is fine if employers want to provide this but making it a matter of law is a bad idea.

[Don W]

Now I see that these rooms are for merely harvesting for later use.

[Mark]

From lactate room to hidden camera to U-Tube.

[FoxInSocks]

As the law states: "to accommodate an employee desiring to express breast milk."

[umgud]

There should be sperm repositories in the mens room.