The Illinois Manufacturers’ Association has been communicating directly with manufacturers across Illinois as the situation changes and will continue posting resources online at the IMA’s dedicated page
www.ima-net.org/covid-19/
.
Daily COVID-19 Results
Governor JB Pritzker held his daily press conference and announced:
- There are 1,287 new cases of coronavirus in Illinois.
- There are a total of 380 deaths related to coronavirus in Illinois, including 73 additional deaths announced today.
- A total of 13,549 cases have been confirmed in at least 77 of the 102 counties
- There have been 68,732 individuals tested in Illinois.
Press Conference Key Updates
New or critical items of note that were discussed today by the Governor:
- Governor Pritzker focused today's press conference on the availability of regular hospital beds, ICU beds and ventilators in Illinois and the impact coronavirus has had on those numbers. There are 28,000 hospital beds with 43% available, 2,700 ICU beds with 35% available and 2,700 ventilators with 57% available (down from 68% a week ago). These numbers do not reflect the five field hospitals being set up in Chicago, the suburbs and Springfield.
- The percentage of beds being occupied by coronavirus patients continues to grow as the number of people in the hospitals for non-COVID-19 patients has dropped.
- Illinois continues to track down ventilators and can shift them around the state as needed. Illinois recently received 100 ventilators from California.
Employer Resources & Programs
The IMA published
a guide
last week on the topics of Federal and State Grants, Unemployment Insurance, and Leave.
The Small Business Association (SBA) Illinois District Office is hosting twice daily webinars on the Economic Injury Disaster Loans starting Thursday. You can find details and register for these training events at
www.sba.gov/il.
The IMA is working on additional webinars and has archived all previous webinars related to coronavirus issues, such as, unemployment insurance benefits and the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act). To listen and watch these webinars,
please click here.
Question & Answer Section
In an effort to clear confusion, the U.S. Department of Labor has issued additional
Families First Coronavirus Response Act
(
FFCRA) guidance to help with implementation. Questions #60-79 are new to the
DOL Q&A guide
and provide answers to questions such as:
75. As an employer, how much do I pay a seasonal employee with an irregular schedule for each day of paid sick leave or expanded family and medical leave that he or she takes?
You may calculate the daily amount you must pay a seasonal employee with an irregular schedule by taking the following steps.
First, you should calculate how many hours of leave your seasonal employee is entitled to take each day. Because your employee works an irregular schedule, this is equal to the average number of hours each day that he or she was scheduled to work over the period of employment, up to the last six months.
Second, you should calculate the seasonal employee’s regular hourly rate of pay. This is calculated by adding up all wages paid over the period of employment, up to the last six months, and then dividing that sum by the number of hours actually worked over the same period.
Third, you multiply the daily hours of leave (first calculation) by your employee’s regular hourly rate of pay (second calculation) to compute the base daily paid leave amount.
Fourth, you should determine the actual daily paid leave amount, which depends on the type of paid leave taken and the reason for such paid leave.
You must pay your seasonal employee the full base daily paid leave amount, up to $511 per day and $5,110 in total, if the employee is taking paid sick leave for any of the following reasons:
- Your employee is subject to a Federal, State, or local quarantine or isolation order related to COVID-19;
- Your employee has been advised by a health care provider to self-quarantine due to concerns related to COVID-19; or
- Your employee is experiencing symptoms of COVID-19 and is seeking a medical diagnosis.
You must pay your seasonal employee 2/3 of the base daily paid leave amount, up to $200 per day and $2,000 in total, if your employee is taking paid sick leave for any of the following reasons:
- Your employee is caring for an individual who either is subject to a quarantine or isolation order related to COVID-19 or who has been advised by a health care provider to self-quarantine due to concerns related to COVID-19;
- Your employee is caring for his or her child whose school or place of care is closed, or child care provider is unavailable, due to COVID-19 related reasons; or
- Your employee is experiencing any other substantially similar condition, as determined by the Secretary of Health and Human Services.
You must pay your seasonal employee 2/3 of the base daily paid leave amount, up to $200 per day and $10,000 in total, if the employee is taking expanded family and medical leave to care for the employee’s child whose school or place of care is closed, or child care provider is unavailable, due to COVID-19-related reasons. Please note that if your seasonal employees are not scheduled to work, for example, because it is the off-season, then you do not have to provide paid sick leave or expanded family and medical leave.
