The Seattle City Council added new protections for gig workers including food delivery workers who have become increasingly vital during the COVID-19 crisis.
On Monday afternoon, the council unanimously passed legislation extending paid sick and safe leave to gig workers — protecting workers of app-based transportation and meal delivery services.
Sponsored by council member Teresa Mosqueda, Council Bill 119793 extends the 2012 Paid Sick and Safe Time Ordinance to protect gig workers hired as “independent contractors,” according to the new bill’s memorandum. PSST provides days off due to personal illness or to care for sick family members as well as time off for safety issues such as domestic violence.
“We also recognize that these protections largely only apply to traditional W-2 employees and that’s why it’s problematic to leave gig workers out — especially at a time where we’ve seen gig work dramatically increase in the past decade,” Mosqueda said.
This legislation aims to protect gig workers’ economic and physical well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic, and to protect the general public from the coronavirus spread by paying workers to stay home when sick.
“Paid sick and safe leave … is not just about the workers it protects, though that’s critical. It’s also about protecting the community at-large,” Mosqueda said. “When workers go to work sick they interact with other people, they take longer to recover, they have the potential to infect their coworkers and members of the public.”
The requirements of the bill will apply to entities hiring at least 250 workers, including Lyft and Uber Eats, and payment will be calculated from gig workers’ average daily earnings from their highest earning month beginning October 2019.
“Especially now during the coronavirus given the amount of work that is happening right now — from workers who are delivering food, who are delivering groceries, who are driving people to essential appointments across our city — we need to make sure that their needs are met,” Mosqueda said.
Key points of the legislation include the ability to use up to three consecutive sick or safe days off without needing a doctor’s note and the option to carry over nine sick or safe days to the next year. The Office of Labor Standards (OLS) will enforce the legislation, and the requirement to accrue and use sick and safe days will stay in effect for 180 days once Mayor Durkan ends the civil emergency related to COVID-19.
“It should go stated explicitly that the vast majority of workers that we’re talking about protecting today are Black and Brown workers,” Mosqueda said. “And the vast number of people that have been left out of state and federal policy in terms of labor protections are Black and Brown workers.”
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