Polis declares state of emergency over coronavirus spread, paid sick leave for service workers
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DENVER — In an effort to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus throughout Colorado, Gov. Jared Polis declared a state of emergency and directed the state’s labor department to craft emergency rules for paid sick leave in service sectors.
The new rules, expected to go into effect by Wednesday, will cover hourly workers in foodservice, hospitality, childcare, education and home health-care jobs if they need to stay home while exhibiting flu-like symptoms or are awaiting test results for the COVID-19 virus.
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In a press conference Tuesday morning, Polis asked private businesses to voluntarily offer sick leave to hourly workers if they don’t already.
He argued not incentivizing sick workers to stay home puts them in a position of potentially spreading the virus to vulnerable people or missing work and taking a personal financial hit.
“The men and women in these professions want to do right by their fellow Coloradans and stay home when they’re ill, but that’s a very hard call when the loss of wages means missing rent or not putting food on your table,” he said.
Cher Haavind, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment, told BizWest that the rules likely will require employers to give potentially infected workers up to four days of paid leave or enough time for them to receive test results.
Emergency rules take effect for 30 days and can be renewed for up to a total of 120 days before state agencies have to submit them to public comment and review as a permanent guideline.
However, it’s not clear if the private sector will follow Polis’ request to expand sick leave beyond the emergency rules. The Colorado Restaurant Association did not have a response when reached Tuesday afternoon.
Amie Mayhew, president and CEO of the Colorado Hotel and Lodging Association, said the majority of the group’s members already provide some amount of sick leave to employees, but giving more sick time would be a decision made higher up the corporate ladder for hotel chains.
Polis also suggested the state labor agency may also open unemployment insurance claims and other wage replacements to workers who test positive but don’t have built-in sick leave benefits, but Haavind said the agency would have to determine if that is possible without a federal disaster declaration.
State officials also confirmed three new cases in Eagle, Arapahoe and Gunnison counties, bringing the number of COVID-19 cases in Colorado to 15 as of Tuesday morning.
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