Note: This commentary originally appeared on Medium.

By Wendy Chun-Hoon and Isha Weerasinghe

A decade ago, our organization, the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), was at the District of Columbia’s Wilson Building with advocates, local business owners, families, and workers from across the city, calling on D.C. City Council and Mayor Muriel Bowser to pass paid family and medical leave. As a national anti-poverty organization, CLASP knows how important access to paid leave is to families’ economic success.

As CLASP’s executive director and someone responsible for employing 40 staff, I’ve seen how essential D.C.’s paid leave program is to our own employees’ well-being, our business continuity, and our organization’s sustainability. By contributing modest and routine premiums on behalf of our workforce, we share the cost of this priceless benefit among all District employers. This means my staff can access this critical insurance program in times of emergency and when caring for a loved one, and we value all workers in D.C. being able to afford to take paid leave when they need to.

In fact, our regional economy benefits from workers having access to wage replacement when they need time away from work to address their own health needs or to care for a loved one. This is why Maryland and Virginia have followed D.C.’s lead in passing paid leave laws. Laws like these have helped to stabilize the region’s economy through the twin devastations of the pandemic and the Trump Administration’s recent mass federal layoffs.

Which is why, despite the Council restoring some of the cuts originally proposed by Mayor Bowser, D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson’s budget still flies in the face of good business sense. The fund’s solvency shows that D.C.’s employers are committed to a program proven to deliver a return on investment in our city’s resilience and our employees’ well-being. But Chairman Mendelson’s budget still lacks investment in D.C.’s working families and small businesses. While the new budget prevents a fiscal year 2027 benefit freeze, it still cuts both the number of weeks of family and medical leave and the benefit amount. This is contrary to the District’s best interests and makes D.C. the first and only jurisdiction to reduce benefits after implementing a paid leave program.

To date, eight CLASP employees have benefitted from D.C. Paid Family Leave, Isha Weerasinghe being one of them. D.C.’s program made it possible for Isha and her husband to continue to live and work in the District when they decided to become parents.

They chose to expand their family in D.C. because they loved the city and its progressive and inclusive policies. They were heartened when D.C.’s paid leave policy became law, giving them the opportunity to have paid time off to spend with their newborn. And that time was particularly crucial, as their child was born during the COVID-19 pandemic, when they couldn’t rely on their usual networks for support. D.C.’s policies to support families were always a reason for Isha and her husband to stay in the city and, in turn, they have given back — not just as taxpayers, but through local activism, volunteering, and her husband’s position on the Advisory Neighborhood Commission.

Thanks to D.C.’s Paid Family Leave program, thousands of workers have been able to welcome a child, take care of an ill family member, or navigate their own health crisis secure in the knowledge that the essential work of caregiving would not leave them destitute. At CLASP, we’ve long known that when paid leave goes away, people experiencing health crises return to work before they’re ready, delay treatment, or leave the workforce entirely. As the Trump Administration and Congress have torn our country’s safety net apart, programs like D.C.’s Paid Family Leave are the line between economic security and poverty.

Since 2017, D.C. employers and workers alike have benefited from a program that protects businesses, employees, families, and our regional economy. Now it’s time for the D.C. Council to protect all of us and fully restore the Paid Family Leave program.

Wendy Chun-Hoon is the executive director of the Center for Law and Social Policy, in Washington, D.C. Isha Weerasinghe is CLASP’s director of Public Benefits Justice. Both are moms raising young kids in the DMV and are grateful to have paid family medical leave.