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Senate passes workplace breastfeeding policy for public employees; anti-discrimination clarification fails
Summary
Senate passed HB242 requiring public employers to adopt breastfeeding-support policies (reasonable breaks, private space, refrigeration and outlets) but first substitute HB105 — which would have clarified breastfeeding as a pregnancy‑related protected condition in anti‑discrimination law — did not pass in this excerpt.
Senator Iwamoto presented House Bill 242 to require state and local public employers to adopt written policies supporting breastfeeding employees. The bill describes reasonable breaks, a private, clean and sanitary area, and access to refrigeration, freezer space and an electrical outlet for expressing milk; it also allows an employer to decline compliance if doing so would be an undue hardship on operations.
"It requires some of the things we listed, reasonable breaks, privacy, a clean and sanitary area, refrigerator, freezer, and electrical outlet," Iwamoto said, describing the bill’s workplace accommodations for breastfeeding public employees. He noted the statute applies to both hourly and salaried public employees and includes an undue‑hardship exemption.
The Senate passed HB242 on third reading (recorded as 18 yea, 6 nay) and the measure will be signed by the president in open session. On a related measure, First Substitute House Bill 105 — a clarification that breastfeeding counts as a pregnancy‑related condition under Utah’s anti‑discrimination statute — was presented the same day but did not secure passage in the recorded roll call in this transcript excerpt.
