2024 Oregon Labor & Employment Year End Review

Portland, Ore. (February 18, 2025) - Oregon saw a number of new employment laws enacted and updated in 2024 that employers should be aware of.

Amendments to the Oregon Family Leave Act (“OFLA”) and Paid Leave Oregon (“PLO”)

Oregon employers are subject to both OFLA and PLO. PLO is a relatively new program that provides job protection and wage replacement for employees, while OFLA provides job protection but is unpaid leave.

Significant amendments to OFLA and PLO took effect on July 1, 2024 after Oregon Governor Tina Kotek signed into law Senate Bill 1515. Prior to these amendments, employees on leave could “stack” protected time off by exhausting OFLA and federal Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) time and then also take PLO. These new amendments now make clear that leave taken under OFLA may not be taken concurrently with PLO, and thereby decrease the intersection and overlap of these two Oregon laws. OFLA now covers leave for the following reasons:

1. To provide home care for an ill or injured child or a child with a serious health condition or because their school or care provider is closed due to a public health emergency (up to 12 weeks per year)
    
2. Bereavement leave for death of a family member (up to four weeks per year)
    
3. Pregnancy-related disability leave (up to 12 weeks per year).
    
4. Military family leave (up to two weeks per deployment).

These changes still may still allow employees to stack PLO with FMLA for those employers with 50 or more employees. Other changes include that employees taking PLO may “top up” their pay to their regular compensation with accrued paid time off while on leave. Relatedly, the law requires the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries and the Oregon Employment Department to coordinate and share information with employers about how much PLO compensation employees receive while on leave. This more easily allows employers to accurately “top up” employee pay while the employee is on PLO.

Additionally, changes to PLO now include:

1. Employees may use accrued benefits while they also receive PLO benefits.
    
2. Employers can decide if employees using accrued benefits and PLO benefits at the same time can receive more than their full wage replacement.
    
3. Employers may choose the order that employees use accrued benefits when more than one type of accrued benefit is available to the employee.

Additionally, the law clarifies the related issues with predictive scheduling, which generally applies to large employers that prepare employee schedules 14 days in advance. Those employers can no longer be penalized if an employee’s schedule is changed to accommodate another’s employee’s leave, if the employee fails to give 14 days’ advance notice of the need for leave, or if the employee returns without giving 14 days’ advance notice.

Oregon Minimum Wage

The standard Oregon minimum wage for the remainder of 2024 is $14.70 per hour (standard minimum wage rate) and will remain in effect until July 2025. There are also special wage rates in Oregon for specific locations. These include:

Portland Metro Minimum Wage: $15.95 per hour

Non-Urban Minimum Wage: $13.70 per hour

For more information on these new laws, contact the authors of this alert. Visit our Labor & Employment Practice page for additional alerts in this area.

Authors:

Chris Hawk, Partner

Mark J. Hansen, Associate