New week; new job. 

But that hasn’t stopped news from happening. So we’ll be using this week to catch back up.

First up: The Department of Labor has published its proposed new regulations for military leave FMLA.  But these regulations (topping 500 pages) also contain updates to earlier discussed revisions to the FMLA as well.

The blogging community has been busy trying to sort and report on the release.  Here’s the wrap-up as of early Monday morning. I may update this post later today as additional blogs post their summaries:

  • Michael Fox, at Jottings, has the most detailed summary thus far of the major provisions here. According to Michael: "These proposed rules are not nearly as dramatic as the ones that were originally proposed to the white collar regulations which set off a legislative and political uproar. It will be interesting to see what happens to these. Although there will no doubt be comments from both sides, my initial thoughts are that if anyone should be howling for more, it should be employers."
  • Workplace Prof links to the regulations and has provided ample coverage of the underlying statute before.
  • Ross’ Employment Law Blog hits the highlights as well and notes that "there are substantive changes dealing with the definition of "serious health condition," required notices, joint employers, light duty, overtime, bonuses, substituting paid leave for FMLA leave, voluntary settlement of claims, employer’s failure to designate absences as being FMLA leave, and other matters."
  • The Word reports that you have until April 11, 2008 to provide comments to the new proposed regulations.
  • What’s New reports what’s new with the new regulations as well.

For employers in Connecticut, the challenge will remain trying to incorporate these national regulations into the state statute and deciphering when or if those provisions will even apply to Connecticut leave. Employers should continue to tread cautiously in FMLA issues until the dust settles from the new FMLA provisions and proposed regulations.

UPDATE: The always reliable Jon Hyman at Ohio Employer’s Law Blog also has his first take on the regulations here