McCarther

Kimberly McCarther and Juan Huerta (collectively, plaintiffs) appeal from the trial court's grant of the motion for summary judgment by Pacific Telesis Group, Pacific Bell Telephone Company, Advanced Solutions, Inc., Southwestern Bell Video Services, Inc., Pacific Bell Information Services, SBC Services, Inc., and SBC Telecom, Inc. (collectively, defendants), and the court's denial of plaintiffs' motion for summary adjudication. Plaintiffs' appeal presents a pure question of law. Labor Code section 233 [1] requires employers to allow their employees to use "sick leave," as defined in section 233, to attend to an illness of a child, parent, spouse, or domestic partner, so-called "kin care" leave. Plaintiffs argue that section 233 applies to the "sickness absence" policy to which they are subject as employees of their respective defendant companies. Defendants argue that section 233 applies to "traditional accrual-based sick leave policies" only, and not to the "sickness absence" policy. We conclude that section 233 applies to the policy, and reverse the trial court's judgment.

The parties agreed below about the facts in a stipulated statement of undisputed…