New rules add 32 hours of unpaid leave, broaden covered reasons, and put 56,000 employers on notice
A Quiet Policy Change With Large Consequences for Working New Yorkers
While cameras were pointed at the mayor’s snowstorm press conferences and his Washington D.C. visits, the Mamdani administration was quietly making a change that will affect the daily lives of more than four million working New Yorkers. On February 20, 2026, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Department of Consumer and Worker Protection Commissioner Sam Levine announced a significant expansion of New York City’s Protected Time Off Law — formerly known as the Paid Safe and Sick Leave Law — which took effect just two days later, on February 22.
The changes are substantial. Beginning immediately, employers across New York City are required to make an additional 32 hours of unpaid protected time off available to workers upon hire, and again on the first day of each calendar year. This is in addition to existing paid sick and safe leave requirements. Workers can begin using this time immediately — it does not have to be accrued over weeks or months. The law also expands the list of qualifying reasons for which workers may use protected time off, adding situations such as caring for a child, attending a housing or benefits hearing, or staying home during a declared public emergency.
Compliance Warnings Sent to 56,000 Employers
The city did not leave enforcement to chance. The Department of Consumer and Worker Protection has sent compliance warnings to 56,000 employers across the five boroughs, signaling that the administration intends to actively monitor adherence. DCWP also announced it will implement a new data-driven strategy to identify patterns of non-compliance and target enforcement accordingly. Workers who believe their rights under the law have been violated can file a complaint directly with DCWP through the city’s official portal.
Commissioner Sam Levine, who has overseen an increasingly assertive DCWP under Mamdani, said the expansion is designed to close gaps that left workers without legal protection in situations where their absence from work was clearly justified but not previously covered by the law. The housing hearing provision is particularly notable: it directly intersects with Mamdani’s broader affordability agenda, recognizing that navigating New York City’s housing system — applying for assistance, contesting a landlord, attending a benefits review — is itself a form of labor that takes time and has consequences for workers who cannot afford to miss pay.
Context: What New York City’s Worker Protection Framework Looks Like
New York City has built one of the most robust local worker protection frameworks in the United States over the past decade. The original Earned Safe and Sick Time Act was passed in 2013 and has been expanded several times since. The city’s minimum wage is above the state and federal minimums. The DCWP enforces a range of wage theft, consumer protection, and now expanded leave laws. Mamdani, a democratic socialist who built his political career in significant part on labor and tenant advocacy, has signaled that this trajectory will continue and likely accelerate under his administration.
Labor economists and worker rights advocates have generally praised these expansions, though they note that enforcement remains the critical variable. Laws that guarantee rights on paper are only as strong as the agencies empowered to enforce them, and only as effective as workers’ ability to access those rights without fear of retaliation. The DCWP’s announcement that it will deploy data-driven enforcement strategies is a meaningful step — if it is backed by sufficient staffing and resources.
What Workers Need to Know Now
The 32 additional hours of unpaid protected time off are available immediately upon hire. Employers cannot require workers to find a replacement before using this time, and cannot retaliate against workers who exercise their rights. Workers who are denied protected time off, disciplined for using it, or otherwise subjected to retaliation can file a complaint with DCWP at no cost. The investigation and enforcement process is handled by the city agency, not by the worker, which lowers the barrier for individuals who might otherwise be unable to afford legal representation.
The expansion of covered reasons is equally significant. Adding child care obligations, housing proceedings, and public emergency situations to the list of qualifying uses reflects a recognition that workers’ lives do not divide neatly into “work” and “personal” categories, and that city policy should reflect the actual texture of working people’s circumstances — not an idealized version of them. For a city in which working families routinely navigate housing instability, childcare shortfalls, and bureaucratic proceedings as features of everyday life, this is not a small thing.
For the full text of the Protected Time Off Law, visit the DCWP worker rights page. For national comparisons of paid leave policy, see the U.S. Department of Labor. To file a workplace complaint, visit DCWP complaint portal. For labor policy research, see the Economic Policy Institute.
