NJLAD Amendment to Protect Nursing Mothers in the Workplace

Since 2010, the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) requires employers to provide reasonable break times for nursing mothers to express breast milk.  These break times must be provided for up to 1 year after the birth of the child.  On January 8, 2018, New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination (“NJLAD”) was amended to include a similar requirement.  The NJLAD now requires all New Jersey employers to provide lactation breaks, regardless of the employer’s size and number of employees.

This new amendment to the NJLAD makes it a civil rights violation for an employer to terminate or discriminate against a female employee who breastfeeds or pumps milk on the job. The amendment also imposes a reasonable accommodation requirement, where employers must reasonably accommodate employees with daily break times and a suitable room or other location with privacy so that she can express breast milk for her child. This room must be in close proximity to the employee’s working area. However, it is not required that these breaks be paid, unless the employee is already compensated for breaks. While the FLSA requires that employers allow this accommodation for up to a year after the child’s birth, the new NJLAD amendment does not include any time restriction.

These requirements are effective immediately, unless the employer can demonstrate that providing the accommodation would pose an undue hardship on its operations. Factors to consider when deciding whether providing the accommodation would cause an undue hardship include: the number of employees, the number and type of facilities, the size of the budget, the nature and cost of the accommodation needed, and the extent to which the accommodation would involve waiver of an essential requirement of a job.

For more information about how these new requirements affect your company, please contact Dina M. Mastellone, Esq., Chair of the firm’s Human Resource Training & Audit Programs Practice Group, at dmastellone@genovaburns.com, or 973-533-0777.