S.F. passes law requiring 6 weeks’ paid baby-bonding leave

San Francisco became the first U.S. city to require six weeks of paid leave for new parents Tuesday, nearly doubling the amount of money new parents will bring in while caring for their newborns. [...] the Board of Supervisors doubled down on its liberal credentials by enacting expansive anti-eviction protections for tenants who work in San Francisco schools, from teachers to janitors and cafeteria workers. The bills by supervisors Scott Wiener and David Campos, who are ideological opposites in the condensed world of San Francisco politics, were described as essential to helping keep working families in the city. The Board of Supervisors also passed ordinances by Campos declaring a homeless shelter crisis and requiring “all-gender” bathrooms in most city businesses. “This is absolutely an issue of income inequality where we have higher-paid workers who frequently have better access to parental leave and lower-paid workers have little to no access,” he said. The ordinance would require businesses with 20 or more employees to pay 45 percent of a new parent’s salary while they are on leave for six weeks. The legislation generated strong opposition from some small-business owners, who said it put San Francisco businesses at a disadvantage to competitors in other parts of the state who don’t have to pay for parental leave. [...] Wiener made some compromises that somewhat appeased small businesses. An economic analysis by the San Francisco Controller’s Office found that about 4,600 San Francisco residents file baby bonding claims with the state each year and receive an average of $743.39 in weekly benefits for an average of 5½ weeks. The board also unanimously supported Campos’ legislation that ensures any employee, from principal to janitor, who works at a school or state-licensed day care center cannot be evicted during the school year. The legislation applies to no-fault evictions — where the tenant has not breached the terms of the lease — and covers public, private and parochial schools. No-fault evictions could still be handed to teachers and families during the summer break as defined by the San Francisco Unified School District’s calendar, and teachers could still be evicted any time for failure to pay rent or other issues of their own creation. “Our proposal today shifts us away from a nationally recognized housing-first approach to homelessness while potentially costing our city a great deal of money in a different direction,” he said.