United States: Washington Supreme Court Decision Reminds Employers To Be Mindful When Litigating Matters Under The State's Family Care Act

Seattle, Wash. (July 6, 2023) – On June 29, 2023, the Washington Supreme Court issued its decision in Alaska Airlines v. State of Washington Department of Labor & Industries. This case concerned the Washington Family Care Act, a statute that entitles employees to unpaid leave to care for sick family members. At issue was the following provision:

If, under the terms of a collective bargaining agreement or employer policy applicable to an employee, the employee is entitled to sick leave or other paid time off, then an employer shall allow an employee to use any or all of the employee's choice of sick leave or other paid time off to care for: (a) A child of the employee with a health condition that requires treatment or supervision; or (b) a spouse, parent, parent-in-law, or grandparent of the employee who has a serious health condition or an emergency condition.

RCW 49.12.270(1).

In the Alaska Airlines matter, an employer disciplined an employee for taking time off to care for a sick child because doing so violated the terms of the collective bargaining agreement concerning scheduling vacation time and accruing sick time. A state agency empowered to enforce the state's leave laws sued the employer. The agency argued that the employer violated the Act which, the state claimed, entitled the employee to leave to care for her sick son, despite language to the contrary in the collective bargaining agreement.

Majority Opinion

A slim majority of five Washington Supreme Court justices upheld the employer's decision to discipline the employee. In a straightforward opinion, the majority reasoned that the Act stated that the employee was entitled to leave to care for a family member only if allowed by a collective bargaining agreement or employer policy. Because the employee violated the collective bargaining agreement when she took time off from work to care for her sick son, her absences were unexcused and could result in discipline.

Dissenting Opinion

Four of the nine remaining justices dissented. They read the statute as entitling an employee to leave to care for a child who has a "serious health condition or emergency condition," notwithstanding that the provision at issue entitled an employee to take leave for a spouse, parent, parent-in-law, or grandparent – not a child. In other words, the dissent rewrote the statute even though Washington law requires that unambiguous statutes such as this one be interpreted as written, not as a court believes the statute should have been written.

More fundamentally, the dissent reasoned that the Act could be interpreted in a manner that the dissenting justices believed furthered the underlying policies behind the Act (permitting employees to care for sick family members), regardless of the plain language of the statute. The dissent provides:

Children (or other family members, for that matter) rarely become sick on a schedule. If they did, there would be no need for employee protections like the statute we analyze today. It is not the nature of any "serious health condition or an emergency condition" to occur during a time that is convenient or a time where time off is prescheduled. Were life to work in that manner, we would never need the protections of legislative acts like this one to protect employees from employers who refuse to allow their employees to be by the bedside of their sick child or family member.

Implications

The majority decision makes sense and confirms that the Act does not entitle employees to take leave when doing so violates the terms of a collective bargaining agreement or employer policy. This decision was simply a matter of statutory interpretation and the result was required by the plain language of the statute.

Notably, however, the majority decision garnered only five votes, the slimmest majority possible. Four justices voted to rewrite the statute because they believed doing so was helpful to employees due to the unpredictability of family members' health. The fact that so many justices dissented in a straightforward case serves as a reminder that employers must be mindful of the risks they face when litigating this issue in the State of Washington, particularly in the context of an appeal.

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