Oregon bill would require work schedule predictability

Oregon is on track to become the first state in the country to require work schedule predictability for employees in certain food service, retail or hospitality industries.

Senate Bill 828 passed the Senate 23-6 on Thursday, with all the no votes coming from Republicans. But there were six Republicans that voted in favor of the bill, including Bend’s Tim Knopp who also helped with the bill’s passage.

“It was really important to me,” Knopp said, “because it was important for workers to have some flexibility in terms of their schedules and predictability in knowing what their schedule would be.”

The bill would require companies with 500 or more employees worldwide to give their workers written estimates of their work schedules seven days before the work week begins. If passed, that would extend to 14 days in 2020.

Jimmy John’s General Manager Julia Mills said Friday if the bill becomes law, it could be helpful to some employees.

“Most of my employees actually do have a second job. If they need a second job, I feel like it’s important that they have that open to them, that option, because otherwise it can cross and then you have to ask to get off early,” Mills said.

“Or if you have kids or something like that, it kind of makes everything worse,” she added.

That’s one of the main reasons Knopp pushed for the bill.

“It was clear with a few industries that there was an issue that needed to be resolved, because more people are having multiple jobs.” he said. “And not knowing their schedules impacted their ability to feed their families, pay their rent or mortgage and take care of their families.”

The bill now moves on to the House, and if passed, will move to Gov. Kate Brown’s desk. If it becomes law, it would go into effect in July of 2018.

Knopp said the bill also benefits businesses.

“For the business community, it’s really important for them to have a consistent statewide law that was understandable and didn’t impact small businesses in a big way,” the lawmaker said.

When asked if this would be challenging to get used to, Mills said probably not.

“I think it would be a little bit of a struggle, but I mean, we change all the time and adapt,” she said. “So I don’t really think it would be a hard time, but because we already asked their availability, we’d just have to ask them ahead of time.”

It’s also the topic of our new KTVZ.COM Poll: Should businesses be required to give seven days’ notice of work schedules? Find it halfway down the right side of our home page.