Pennsylvania Nurses Win Paid Family Leave for Entire County

A group of Pennsylvania nurses and community members made history last month when they fought for and won paid family leave for every resident in Allegheny County. The county is the first in the nation to institute such a benefit; under the legislation that county council members approved 11-to-4, employers with 15 or more workers must provide new parents with 12 weeks of paid time off. The benefit will apply to about 8,000 people and takes effect next October.

The win is one step toward resolving the county’s maternal and infant mortality crisis. Multiple studies show that infants die at higher rates in Allegheny County than the state average and that Black infants are more than twice as likely to die as white infants. Babies are also more likely to be born prematurely or underweight. Severe maternal morbidity in the county, meanwhile, rose by 55 percent between 2016 and 2022.

“Offering paid parental leave is not just an incentive—it’s something that will definitely prop up our community health in a way that we’ll start to see more families flourish,” said Marchel Robinson, a registered nurse at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) Magee-Womens Hospital, who, with her colleagues, fellow union members, and allies across the county, organized to win the benefit. Having enough time off, especially for people with medically complex pregnancies and postpartum recoveries, will mean healthier outcomes for both parents and babies.

“We do have an increased maternal mortality rate, it very much affects Black maternity, and something I’ve learned working at the bedside with these patients is that complicated delivery, complicated recovery, takes time,” Robinson said. “Recovery doesn’t end when they leave our hospitals. It’s just getting started.”

Moms forced to return to work, who miss time to bond, breastfeed, and go to medical appointments, can end up back in the hospital with infections and other problems, she added.

“The postpartum period is not just rainbows and butterflies,” Robinson said, “it’s doctor’s appointments, sleepless nights, and dealing with a fussy baby.”

Magee nurses launched their organizing drive on Mother’s Day. With community members and elected officials, they surveyed county residents, knocked on doors to hold one-on-one conversations, hosted events to get the word out, and phone-banked hundreds of calls to the county council.

A record number of comments flooded into the county—1,400—which showed residents were in favor of the benefit by a rate of 2-to-1. The original proposal would have required businesses to provide 18 weeks of leave for new parents. About a quarter of business owners who commented said they would support the benefit if it was reduced.

The policy was popular across party lines. Ninety-six percent of Democrats, 76 percent of independents, and 70 percent of Republicans were in favor, according to the Parental Leave to Help Families Thrive Coalition, which includes Magee nurses who are members of the state’s largest caregiver union, SEIU Healthcare PA, Working Families Party PA, United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers, and several other unions and groups across the state that organized for the win.

Members built on the work that local leaders had undertaken for years, including of Allegheny County Councilmember Lissa Geiger Shulman, who told the Prospect she spent the last decade advocating for paid family leave. Under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, most workers at companies with at least 50 employees have access to unpaid leave. Just 14 states and the District of Columbia have mandatory paid family leave laws, and Pennsylvania is not one of them. But that doesn’t mean local communities are helpless.

Shulman’s advice for city and county leaders elsewhere is the advice she took herself: “Use the powers that are given to you.”

Allegheny County is one of Pennsylvania’s eight counties governed by a home rule charter, giving its elected leaders substantial authority over local legislation. Local leaders should determine what powers they have, she said, “and then use those powers to the fullest extent that they can” to benefit residents. Shulman also encouraged leaders to understand that a people-first approach, rather than a business-first, is what makes a strong economy.

“Of course our businesses need help, because costs are rising on everyone and small businesses are not excluded from that pain,” Shulman said. But, at the same time, “when workers are thriving, because they’re cared for, because they’re healthy, that’s what makes our businesses thrive and our economy thrive.”

Mcgee nurse practitioner Lucy Rose Ruccio, who works in the neonatal intensive care unit, told the Prospect that the win for the county is also a win for the nurses’ union, which formed two years ago. Members have been working to settle their first contract since then, a struggle that has pitted unionized workers against managers at UPMC, the largest employer in Pennsylvania.

There are a lot of forces working against them, but taking the high road and prioritizing the community to win a benefit that affects everyone is what keeps her and her co-workers going, Ruccio said. Shortly after a signing ceremony for the law, she said she felt inspired and hopeful, and reflected that the organizing drive was one of the rare public instances where people across political divides agreed on the same priority.

“It’s such dark times, in many ways, and it can feel like you’re screaming in the void, especially politically,” Ruccio said. “Organized labor is one of the few opportunities we have to have real conversations across the political divide.”

Nurses in her union have a range of political opinions, “but when you’re having real conversations,” she said, “and talking about what do people today need in our community, you can realize, Republican, Democratic, independent, we all want to be home with our kids after they’re born.”

Sometimes, she added, those conversations can lead someone to see things differently.

“We saw in the county council boardroom that the testimony of average people was incredibly important to the decisive end vote of 11-to-4,” Ruccio said. “There were several council members who said, ‘I have my reservations,’ or sit with the business community, but the raw testimony was so moving that they changed their vote at the last minute, which is something we never hear. People are so entrenched.”