Dallas has joined both Austin and San Antonio in having its paid sick leave ordinance temporarily blocked amid legal challenges claiming the laws violate constitutional rights.

In a case that labor and employment lawyers have been tracking closely, a Dallas-Fort Worth-area law firm, staffing agency and the state of Texas challenged the legality of the Dallas ordinance, which would have given 64 hours of sick leave to people at large employers, and 48 hours of leave to people at small employers.

In Texas, employers are not mandated to provide paid sick leave, although many companies voluntarily do so as a benefit. But Dallas, Austin and San Antonio metros passed their ordinances requiring paid sick leave around the same time. All face legal challenges.

The argument is that the state Legislature had already set the minimum wage in Texas, and mandating additional paid sick leave is essentially raising the minimum wage. Because the Texas Constitution prohibits a city from passing ordinances that conflict with state law, the plaintiffs argue the city sick leave laws are unconstitutional.

The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas in Sherman adopted reasoning by Austin's Third Court of Appeals, which previously held that state law—the Texas Minimum Wage Act—preempts cities from enacting sick leave ordinances. Judge Sean Jordan acknowledged that his ruling came during a time when the nation was dealing with crisis and upheaval from the coronavirus, and Congress has granted 80 hours of paid sick leave to people who become infected. But in the present case, state law guides what Texas cities can do, he wrote.

"The court's decision to grant a preliminary injunction upholds the state constitution and statutory provisions preempting and rendering unenforceable the city's paid sick leave ordinance," Jordan wrote, noting that the Texas Supreme Court has a pending case over Austin's sick leave ordinance to decide the preemption issue for good.

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Dallas representative Deme Jackson declined to comment.

Plaintiffs attorney Robert Henneke, general counsel for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, said Jordan's ruling is consistent with the outcome of the Austin and San Antonio sick leave cases. Henneke is also involved in those cases.

"It is unconstitutional for cities to regulate and mandate wages," said Henneke. "Part of the story is that this is yet one more court that has reached the same outcome."

The Dallas case is proceeding in federal court instead of state court, since the plaintiffs are headquartered in Collin County, but had employees in Dallas who would be subject to the sick leave ordinance.

Hagan Law Group, a management-side employment firm headquartered in the Collin County town of Allen, claimed in the lawsuit that the ordinance would make the firm buy new time-tracking software and incur other implementation costs, as well as pay the money for employees' sick leave.

The firm, and another plaintiff, Plano-based staffing agency ESI/Employee Solutions, allege in ESI/Employee Solutions v. City of Dallas that the new sick leave ordinance violates the U.S. and state constitutions and clashes with a state minimum wage law. The state of Texas joined the lawsuit later.

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