I have a friend who asked me for some advice since I'm a union President in another city and we both work in the same profession. I can't find an answer for her, so I'm hoping someone here can point me in the right direction.

My friend is currently off on maternity leave from a city job. She has been advised by her employer that when she gets back, she's being reassigned to another shift in case she gets pregnant again (this is exactly what her boss told her). Her employer says he wants her on a shift that has extra personnel in case she gets pregnant again.

First off, her boss has been pretty hostile about her being off on maternity leave in the first place, so this stinks of some sort of discrimination, but I can't find anything in pregnancy rights law that would speak to this.

Municipal governments are not exempt from the FMLA. It's not a violation yet, but if it occurs after her FMLA leave, then we have a violation. She HAS applied for FMLA leave under the city procedures, right?

Upon return from FMLA leave, an employee must be restored to his or her original job, or to an "equivalent" job, which means virtually identical to the original job in terms of pay, benefits, and other employment terms and conditions.


http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/whd/1421.htm#2l

It might not be a bad idea for her to ask this question of the Human Resources Division. Non-accusatory, but maybe something like, "My supervisor said he was going to put me on a different shift when I returned from FMLA. I don't believe that is allowable under the law." See what they say.

Yes, it's my understanding that she's currently off on FMLA. So it sounds like if they move her after she gets back, it could be a violation of FMLA.

Assuming that she's actually on FMLA, yes.

If the employer doesn't automatically reassign to a better covered shifts, other employees who have been on leave for a short term disability, doing so because an employee might become pregnant again would violate the Pregnancy amendment to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.