Other Views: Sometimes working parents need paid time off

I am not sure if my daughter was infirst or second grade. If she was in second grade it would make her 7. It was over 20 years ago. She had the stomach flu the night before. I was up all night with her and called my supervisor that I cant come into work. I left a message on her answering machine. She called me back and told me I had to come in as I was running a meeting. I repeated my daughter is throwing up, several times. I had PTO. Supervisor is female.

Other examples:

• Single mother working at Daktronics tells me she leaves her 4-year-old home alone as the company has no PTO or sick days. She works full time, but SD has labor laws that they dont have to give employees benefits? If she misses a day, she is not paid and cant make ends meet, so she leaves her children home alone.
• My girlfriend, single mother, cant pick up her grade school kids (kindergarten and up) if they get sick at school. They have to catch a city bus and walk home.
• Female welder at TCF plant in Mitchell tells me she cant find day care for her infant after her husband leaves her. The husband worked first shift and she worked second shift. Day care wont take an infant at 5:30 a.m. and there is a waiting list. I ask VP if we can allow her to start her shift later so that she has day care. No! She is forced to leave company and moves out west to live with relatives.
• Niece babysitter has closed so many times she is forced to bring her infant into work.
• Daughter, a teacher, tells me she has children in her third grade, skipping school, so that her single mother can work to earn money. She stays home and babysits her younger brother.
• My daughter and son-in-law have used all their PTO due to COVID day care closure. I have major surgery on my wrist (four plates) after a bad fracture. My arm is in a cast from my wrist to my elbow and I have a nerve block for the pain. I have lifting restrictions. I drive two hours, each day, to babysit my grandchildren, one of which is an infant and crawls, two days after surgery, as their day care has closed for the fifth time.
• I worked for Twin City Fan and Blower in Brookings from 1995-1999. When I worked at TCF we had no PTO for one year, five days after one year and 10 days after two years. Nothing more.

All of this is insane. We need better PTO or paid vacation or something.

Mary Ebert,Brookings