Opinion ID: 2507746
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Extent of leave under the FMLA

Text: Finally, the Municipality claims that even if Gregg established the elements of her FMLA claim, she did not qualify for further FMLA protection because by April 11, 1997, the Municipality had already given her the full extent of leave permitted under the Act. According to the Municipality's argument, Gregg took thirteen weeks of leave before she resigned, which is actually more than the Act guarantees, thus she suffered no prejudice from its refusal to grant her further leave. [37] The Municipality failed to raise this factual argument in the trial court, and it misstates the trial court's conclusion on appeal. The Municipality could be correct only if the court had found that it violated 29 C.F.R. § 825.700(a), the failure to properly designate Gregg's leave. Section 825.700(a) provides in pertinent part that [i]f an employee takes paid or unpaid leave and the employer does not designate the leave as FMLA leave, the leave taken does not count against an employee's FMLA entitlement. For § 825.700(a) to be relevant, the Municipality would have had to establish that it had granted Gregg twelve weeks of FMLA leave concurrent with her regular department leave, and had simply failed to designate it as such. Instead the court found that Gregg was entitled to further FMLA leave in April, when she was forced to resign. [38] How much additional leave is a question of fact, which cannot be raised for the first time on appeal. [39]