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But Megan’s mother, Syverson’s ex-wife, was unable to get off work to visit her daughter. So Syverson, of Blair, Wis., went to a state lawmaker for help.
Now the state Legislature is considering a bill that would grant unpaid leave from work to the soldiers and their families when the soldier is called up on active duty.
“It’s important that when people have to go off to war, that their families can at least get their affairs in order,” said Syverson, the Trempealeau County clerk. “If something does happen to her, there isn’t that being able to say, ‘I love you.’”
The bill, which had a hearing last month in a Senate committee, has bipartisan support in the Legislature. But it’s also opposed by a powerful state business lobby that claims the proposal would stick red tape to businesses that generally already are helping soldiers.
The bill’s author, state Sen. Kathleen Vinehout, D-Alma, said she saw the proposal as a small way for the state and citizens to thank soldiers and their families for their sacrifices.
“Time is so precious, and sometimes the time right before military people are deployed is very chaotic and stressful,” Vinehout said. “This is a way to ease some of that burden.”
The bill would apply to any member of the military or National Guard deployed on active duty for 30 days or more, as well as their spouse, children and parents, Vinehout said.
For businesses of between 15 and 50 employees, workers could take up to 15 days of unpaid leave. For businesses of more than 50 employees, workers could take up to 30 days.
The employee would have to give two weeks’ notice for a leave of five days or more but only “reasonable” notice for smaller leaves.
Heather Mills, a legislative analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures, said six states, including Illinois, Minnesota and Indiana, have passed laws allowing for some form of family military leave, though in some cases it’s more restricted than what’s proposed in Wisconsin.
Senate Majority Leader Judy Robson, D-Beloit, strongly supports the bill and intends to get it passed through committee and approved by the whole Senate as soon as possible, spokesman Joshua Wescott said.
Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem, hasn’t seen the bill yet but would “seriously consider” it, spokesman John Murray said.
As Megan Syverson prepared for a seven-month deployment with a Navy unit guarding targets like Persian Gulf oil rigs from potential terrorists, she had to decide how to make her truck payments, how to deal with her apartment lease, whether her legal documents were in order and who would care for her puppy, Paul Syverson said.
Wisconsin National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Tim Donovan said the Guard does not want to place unneeded burdens on businesses. But the Guard also would support helping military families and deploying soldiers who may have to deal with burdens of their own, he said.
Donovan said he was aware in the last year of two cases — ultimately resolved — of Wisconsin National Guard families being unable to get time off from work to be with soldiers about to be deployed.
Anthony Hardie, executive assistant for the state Department of Veterans Affairs, said his agency supported the general concept of the bill.
But the bill faces opposition from business lobby Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce.
John Metcalf, director of human resources policy for WMC, said his group’s main concern was how the bill proposes attaching the leave for military families to the state’s existing Family Medical Leave Act.
That state law is a headache for employers, he said, because it lets employees take leaves of an hour or less and lets them use paid sick leave or disability leave even if they are well and taking the leave for another reason, such as the birth of a child, he said.
“It just drives employers crazy,” Metcalf said of the existing Family Medical Leave law.
Kris Levanetz, state legislative affairs director for the Wisconsin Society for Human Resource Management Council, said the proposal would make small employers with less than 50 employees subject to some provisions of the Family Medical Leave law for the first time.
The proposal also didn’t ensure families wouldn’t use the leave for something other than visiting or helping a soldier, she said.
Syverson said that, as county clerk, he never had trouble processing Trempealeau County workers’ Family Medical Leave requests. Vinehout said she was “disheartened” by WMC’s criticisms.
“These concerns pale in significance when we think of the tremendous sacrifice that the families and the active-duty personnel have made,” Vinehout said.
Vinehout said her office was looking at possible ways to amend the military leave bill to respond to some of the criticisms, including the possibility of not using the Family Medical Leave Act.
Jason Stein is a reporter for the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison.
Been there wrote on Aug 29, 2007 5:25 AM: