Texas State Workers Can Exhaust Paid Parental Leave Before NICU Babies Come Home, Employee Group Says

The House Subcommittee on Maternal Health, Menopause and Access to Evidence-Based Medicine heard Nov. 6 that Texas state employees can use up their paid parental leave while a newborn is still in a neonatal intensive care unit. The Texas Public Employees Association asked lawmakers to add separate NICU leave. The topic filled about 72 minutes of the hearing, the panel’s longest block.

State employees get paid parental leave under Senate Bill 222 of the 88th Legislature. Trey Wood of the Health and Human Services Commission told the panel the employee who gives birth is awarded 40 days, and a spouse, gestational surrogate or adoptive parent gets 20. Lara Ty of the State Auditor’s Office said an employee needs 12 months of service and 1,250 hours worked, and that the paid benefit does not reach employees of higher education institutions.

“So far since this went into effect, we’ve had just under 2300 employees at both HHS and state health take advantage of this parental leave,” he said, adding that “99% of those employees who have taken this have actually come back to work following their parental leave.”

Elsie Gonzalez, executive director of the Texas Public Employees Association, named the gap. “Because paid parental leave begins at birth, a parent whose baby is in the NICU can use much or all of that leave before the baby is medically cleared to come home,” she said. She pointed to Colorado, which she said provides up to 12 additional weeks of paid leave for parents of NICU babies. “Texas can and should take a similar approach for its own workforce,” she said. On cost, she cited CDC data: “9.7% of Texas births in 2023 resulted in a NICU admission, and across the state workforce, the number of employees using this benefit in any year is likely to be small.” She said the association has made NICU leave a legislative priority.

Ty told the panel her office found two states with NICU-specific rules. Colorado offers up to 12 additional paid weeks through its family leave program, she said. Illinois offers job-protected but unpaid leave under its Neonatal Intensive Care Leave Act.

Dr. Cynthia Blanco, chief of neonatology services at University Health in San Antonio, described the medical side. Preterm births are higher in rural Texas, she said, while most NICUs sit in big cities, so families are split across long distances. She cited national figures: “23% of women return to work within two weeks after childbirth and 44% within eight weeks. So that means that many of our parents go back to work while we are intubating their babies.”

John Letzler of the Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission warned against writing a narrow rule. He urged lawmakers “not to draft things so narrowly that what you have is a situation where if a child gets sick or has a complication on day 27, the parents are going to be covered for additional leave,” but not on day 29.

Rep. Joanne Shofner, R-Nacogdoches, asked Wood what state workers want added. The biggest request, he said, is intermittent use. “If you start on the leave, you are on that. And if you come back to work even for an hour, that’s it, you’re done,” he said. Asked whether other employers allow it, he said he was not aware of any.

Shofner also pressed Sarah Redington of the Miles Foundation in Fort Worth, who cited $38 billion a year in employer productivity losses tied to child care challenges, on how small businesses could afford such benefits. Redington said most of her network is small and micro-sized employers, which counters the notion that “you have to be a huge corporation to be family friendly.” Alicia Lee of March of Dimes backed a paid family leave system funded across employers.

No vote was taken and no bill number was cited. Pierson’s panel is gathering input for the 90th Legislature, which convenes in January 2027. The Dispatch previewed the hearing and earlier covered the panel’s Sept. 15 hearing.

Fact box

• Issue: Parental leave for state employees and NICU leave (approx. 72 minutes, about 42 percent of the hearing)
• When: Friday, Nov. 6, 2026 · run time 2:51:04
• Where: Room E2.030, Capitol Extension, Austin
• Chair: Rep. Katrina Pierson, R–Rockwall (HD-33)
• Key witnesses: Lara Ty, State Auditor’s Office; Trey Wood, HHSC; Dr. Cynthia Blanco, University Health; Elsie Gonzalez, Texas Public Employees Association; John Letzler, Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission; Sarah Redington, Miles Foundation; Alicia Lee, March of Dimes
• Archived video: house.texas.gov video 22888