A pair of bipartisan Ohio senators want to create a state-funded family and medical leave insurance program.

Ohio state Sens. Beth Liston, D-Dublin, and Bill Blessing, R-Colerain Township, introduced Ohio Senate Bill 396 which would provide Ohio workers with up to 14 weeks of job-protected paid leave for personal medical needs, caring for seriously ill family members or caring for new children.

“It will help to grow our population by telling those workers who want to start families or to add to their families that Ohio has their back,” Blessing said.

More than three-fourths of Ohioans do not have access to paid leave and a typical Ohio worker who takes four weeks of unpaid leave loses nearly $3,100, according to Time to Care Ohio.

“That means when they have a family health emergency, they are faced with a devastating choice — do they stay home with a sick child? Do they care for an aging parent in need? Do they tend to their own health crisis, or do they keep their paycheck?” Blessing said.

No Ohioan should have to make that choice, he said.

The bill would create a paid family leave fund maintained by the state from an additional payroll contribution from both employees and employers of about 0.4%. The family and medical leave insurance fund would be in custody of the treasurer of state, but not part of the state treasury.

The bill would allow someone to take off up to 14 weeks for a qualifying event and up to 18 weeks a year.

Under the bill, workers would be paid 85% of their pay with a maximum benefit up to $1,231 per week. An employee would also have their job protected while they are on leave.

The director of Ohio Job and Family Services would administer the program, which would begin in 2028.

An employer with less than 15 employees would be exempt from the payroll contribution, but their employees would still contribute their half and be eligible for pay.

The federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave per year.

But 40% of Ohio workers are not eligible for the Family and Medical Leave Act, according to Time to Care Ohio.

Both of Liston’s now-adult children were born during her medical residency and her husband ended up staying home with their kids due to the high cost of child care. Liston was able to take six weeks of unpaid leave when her daughter was born.

“We built up credit card debt, which we struggled to stay on top of, even after my paycheck came back,” she said. “My son was born at the end of my residency, and once again, they entered a time of no income.”

Her family eventually moved to Columbus in part because of financial stresses.

“(Our debt) snowballed as we couldn’t climb out of the hole that began when my daughter was born,” Liston said. “Out of necessity, I started working full-time at my current employer four and a half weeks after my son was born. … It’s really hard to recover from the financial hit of taking unpaid leave.”

Madison Greenspan’s three-year-old twin daughters were born prematurely at 27 weeks and spent weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit.

Despite saving up vacation and sick days, she went back to work three weeks after her caesarean section.

“When it takes 45 and 65 days for your children to come home from the hospital, you start doing the math in your head and making some really hard choices,” said Greenspan, who lives in the Cleveland area.

“Be there to hold them, advocate for them when they’re in the NICU, or be there to take care of them when they can finally come home,” she said. “We are forcing parents to make the impossible decision to be there for the NICU babies, or to keep their jobs to care for those babies when they come home.”

After having her daughters home for a month and half, she got a letter in the mail from her employer saying her family and medical leave was running out and they needed to know her plans for returning to work.

“But that was the same week that one of my daughters had a medical emergency that required me to keep her alive with CPR on the living room floor until medics arrived,” Greenspan said. “How could I possibly go back to work at this time, when we were still just fighting for basic survival and better health for our daughters?”

If state-funded paid family leave existed, she believes she would have had a chance to keep her job and care for her daughters.

“It was hard losing my job because my career has always been part of who I am, and I have lost so much myself that year,” Greenspan said. “I just really want to keep that one piece.”

Fourteen states and the District of Columbia have guaranteed paid leave: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Washington, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

The Ohio bill was introduced last month and has yet to have had any hearings so far in the Senate Financial Institutions, Insurance and Technology Committee.

Blessing said he thinks the Republican leadership in the Ohio Statehouse is going to have to look at this bill.

“I would imagine it is incredibly popular amongst Ohioans,” he said.

Megan Henry is a reporter for the Ohio Capital Journal