Federal Panel Upholds Unpaid Paternity Leave

CHICAGO —  A father whose right to take unpaid paternity leave from his job has been upheld says other men should follow suit to “find out what they’ve been missing.”

Stephen Ondera, 36, a customer service representative for Commonwealth Edison Co., is entitled to the same right as any working woman to take parental leave, according to a consent decree signed Friday by his employer and the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

The decree will allow Ondera, who has used vacation time to stay home since his daughter’s birth in mid-May, to remain away from his job up to six more months to help his wife care for Jennifer Ann.

‘Any Man . . . Should Try It’

“Any man that has a chance should try it,” Ondera said Friday night from his home in Sleepy Hollow, about 35 miles northwest of Chicago. “Once they’ve done it, they’ll find out what they’ve been missing all along.”

Ondera, a 16-year employee of Edison except for a four-year stint in the military, asked the company in January for permission to take leave after the birth of the couple’s first child, he said.

“We just didn’t think there’d be any problem. We thought parental leave was for everybody,” he said.

But the company turned him down and repeated its denial after his union filed a grievance, Ondera said. He then turned to the EEOC.

The EEOC contended that Commonwealth Edison routinely grants unpaid personal leave to women, enabling them to remain at home and care for infants for the first six months after birth.

The resulting decree “establishes a clear precedent that individual job rights must not be affected based on the individual’s sex,” said Kathleen Blunt, director of EEOC’s Chicago district.

Commonwealth Edison spokeswoman Barbara Arnold said that the request by Ondera “was the first of its kind.”

“Whether this means there will be more men doing this is a better question for the Chicago Chamber of Commerce,” she said. “But what you grant to one person obviously in the future you’d have to grant to someone else who requests it.”

“It’s been just great to see the baby change from day-to-day,” Ondera said. “And I think it helps the mother. I don’t think she should have to do it all by herself. It’s good for both to learn.”

Ondera’s wife, Kathleen, 34, is a high school Spanish teacher who took disability leave to give birth and is on unpaid parental leave through the fall semester, he said.