A day before the paid family and medical leave law goes into effect the first of the year, a group of small business owners met Wednesday afternoon at Bollingberg Chiropractic Clinic with Sen. Gene Dornink and Rep. Patricia Mueller to voice concerns and frustrations over potential impacts of the law.
The law will allow workers up to 12 weeks of paid medical leave and 12 weeks of paid family leave capped out at 20 weeks between the two programs within a single leave.
However, owners worry that the law could strain their small businesses and threaten their livelihood. That idea was passionately taken up by those within the small room Wednesday, which represented seven small businesses in Austin.
“I’m passionate about this topic,” said Faye Bollingberg, owner of Bollingberg. “In 34 years I’ve never seen something so stupid and ridiculous as this that could affect each and everyone of us.”
“This stuff is going to ruin us,” she added. “How many ways are we going to give people not to work.”
The law was championed by Democrats when it was passed last year, but remains a contentious subject among the Republican side of the aisle, who contend that throughout the entire process they were shut out of conversations surrounding the bill.
Both Dornink and Mueller repeatedly said during the meeting that Republicans attempted to bring up amendments to limit the scope of the broadly reaching bill, but failed to get anything through.
“We tried to amend it,” Dornink told those at the meeting. “We didn’t want this to be a one size fits all. Small businesses are not the same.”