BENEFITS DIGEST

Whiteford’s Catherine Smith unpacks a Fourth Circuit decision about an employer that suspected an employee’s medical certification for family leave was fraudulent. In its [August 4 opinion](https://www.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinions/251677.P.pdf), the court held that in November 2021 the law did not clearly establish that an employee had to receive a chance to fix an authenticity problem before his employer contacted the medical provider. That finding could protect the government official from personal liability, but the court sent the case back to determine whether qualified immunity is available for this type of family-leave claim. The decision itself is from August, while the firm’s analysis is new.

Allegheny County’s council voted October 20 to require employer-funded paid parental leave, which Fisher Phillips reports as the first county-level mandate of its kind, and the firm reports that the county executive signed the measure October 22. The mandate provides 12 weeks of leave for employers with at least 15 employees, subject to eligibility conditions and a $4,200 weekly wage-replacement cap. The county’s [amended regulation](https://www.alleghenycounty.us/files/assets/county/v/1/government/health/documents/paid-sick-leave/article-xxiv-paid-sick-and-parental-leave.pdf) separates the effective date, at least 180 days after passage, from the employer implementation deadline, no later than 180 days after that effective date. Fisher Phillips walks through part-time and remote-worker treatment, concurrency with federal Family and Medical Leave Act leave and enforcement exposure, with a ten-step preparation list for Pittsburgh-area employers.

The District of Columbia’s paid-family-leave program got smaller on October 1. Medical-leave benefits drop to 10 weeks, family-care benefits to 6 weeks, and the maximum weekly payment to $1,100, while parental and prenatal durations hold at 12 weeks and 2 weeks. Conn Maciel Carey reminds employers that the program changes don’t reduce obligations under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, its D.C. counterpart or accommodation law, which run on their own tracks. Employee communications describing the program need updating.

Fisher Phillips assembles an open-enrollment checklist that runs from eligibility and the ACA offer requirement through prospective section 125 elections, required disclosures, and enrollment access for employees on FMLA leave or COBRA. The guide collects the 2027 dollar limits announced so far, including HSA figures the article sources to Rev. Proc. 2026-24, and flags the figures still awaiting announcement. The guide’s process reminder is that plan terms, cafeteria-plan rules and enrollment communications have to agree, and that the carrier does not handle compliance by default.

Littler examines Donald v. Toppan, where a Georgia federal court let FMLA interference and retaliation claims proceed past summary judgment after a 15-person reduction in force swept in a production supervisor on intermittent FMLA leave to care for his wife. In her September 28 [order](https://digest.theinnerfirm.com/docs/donald-v-toppan-order-2026-09-28.pdf), Chief Judge Leigh Martin May cited emails suggesting that leave influenced the decision and the company’s failure to explain why it retained another employee in a senior-operator job Donald was qualified to perform. The disability-association, race and sex claims were dismissed, and surviving summary judgment is not a finding that the layoff was retaliatory. Littler’s lesson is to document selection criteria and apply them consistently, because approving leave for years does not inoculate the termination decision.

Constangy’s overview of Maryland’s Family and Medical Leave Insurance program lays out a sequence employers need on a calendar now. Contributions begin January 1, 2027 at 0.90 percent of covered payroll up to the Social Security wage cap, split evenly between employer and employee, with the employer share waived below 15 employees; benefits start January 1, 2028 at up to $1,000 a week for up to 12 weeks. Every employer with a Maryland employee must register on the state portal before January 1, 2027, and employers that want a private plan or self-insurance instead of the state program must file a Declaration of Intent by November 15, 2026, then escrow contributions until approval, projected for summer 2027. Eligibility takes 680 hours of Maryland work across any combination of employers, and the covered family circle is wider than the FMLA’s, with in-laws, grandparents and domestic partners included, so valid FAMLI requests will arrive that the FMLA would not recognize.

A federal judge in Austin approved a settlement between the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and Texas-based University Village Memory Care over its treatment of Army National Guard Combat Medic Specialist Maria Opara. The suit alleged the facility demoted, or attempted to demote, Opara from her night shift supervisor position to a lower-paying one because she took leave to fulfill military orders, then terminated her when she refused the forced demotion. The settlement pays Opara $15,000 and requires the facility to update its USERRA policies and train every employee on them. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon emphasized that each step was independently unlawful, the demotion over her service and the termination for refusing it. Military leave policies deserve the same documentation discipline employers give FMLA.

Judge Bryan sent Sam Lokensgard’s FMLA discrimination and Minnesota Parenting Leave Act claims to trial. Three weeks after telling his brand-new manager he’d need time off for his wife’s fertility appointments and eventually parental leave, the help desk engineer was fired for taking himself out of the call queue during team meetings, a practice the record shows the company tolerated for years without disciplining anyone. The court allowed the retaliation-related claims to proceed, finding that the timing and the company’s history of tolerating the same conduct could support a jury verdict for Lokensgard. The employer also argued the state parental-leave claim failed because no child had been born yet, and the court held the statute protects the request even before a child is conceived. The FMLA entitlement claim and the marital-status discrimination claims were dismissed.

KFF's updated fact sheet gathers the paid-leave patchwork in one place: 82 percent of workers had employer-provided paid sick leave in 2025, but only 27 percent had paid family leave at last measure, and just 56 percent of the workforce is even eligible for unpaid FMLA leave. Eighteen states plus D.C. and 18 localities now mandate paid sick leave, while 14 states and D.C. have paid family and medical leave programs, Virginia this year becoming the first southern state to enact one. Durations run 6 to 52 weeks for a worker's own condition and 8 to 12 for family care, with wage replacement from 50 to 100 percent under varying caps and eligibility rules. For multistate employers the map is the point, and it is moving in both directions at once: D.C.'s benefit cuts take effect Thursday, and the Pittsburgh area votes today on a new parental leave mandate.

The county that includes Pittsburgh votes Monday on a scaled-back version of its paid parental leave mandate. After more than 1,500 comments, the Board of Health cut the proposed leave from 18 weeks to 12, capped the weekly benefit at $4,200, and narrowed coverage from all employers to those with 15 or more employees. Full-time employees would qualify after 180 continuous days. The revision also adds stillbirth as a qualifying event, lets FMLA leave run concurrently, and would raise the county's separate paid sick leave accrual to one hour per 30 worked, up to 72 hours a year. If the Board approves on September 28, the measure still needs the county council and the county executive.

An employee who has used all available leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act may still need an accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Bricker's Daniel Burke and Briana Blair urge employers to recognize accommodation requests even when employees don't use legal terms. Employers should continue discussing possible accommodations after FMLA leave runs out, focus on how the condition affects the employee's work, and consider options such as modified schedules or temporary remote work.

A Florida federal court rejected a Mattress Firm manager's FMLA claims over Saturdays off to take her teenage son to DJ classes. According to HR Dive's account of the September 15 decision, she described the classes as therapeutic, but no provider had prescribed them. Her son had previously undergone a brief evaluation under Florida's Baker Act. He was no longer receiving continuing treatment and had stopped seeing his therapist around the time the classes began. On this record, calling the classes therapeutic wasn't enough to establish an FMLA entitlement.

AI can help employers process leave requests more efficiently and consistently, writes Gallagher's Alec Herring in Employee Benefit News. But using the technology doesn't reduce an employer's responsibilities under the ADA or FMLA. Employers remain accountable for their leave decisions even when software handles much of the work.

The federal Family and Medical Leave Act has long served as the primary framework governing employee leave, but an expanding patchwork of state paid family and medical leave laws now adds obligations that multistate employers must track alongside it.

Bricker Graydon on the health-premium recovery question every employer eventually faces: what happens to premiums the employer advanced during FMLA leave when the employee never comes back.

The recent spate of wildfire-induced air pollution provided a view of the direct effect extreme weather events may have on leave management.

The court’s analysis involved determining whether the Chicago Transit Authority’s request for a third opinion on his leave certification comported with the law.