BILL NUMBER:S5273

TITLE OF BILL:  An act to repeal subdivision (f) of section 217 of the
general municipal law relating to service award programs

PURPOSE:  To eliminate a service award penalty imposed upon certain
public employees who perform duties as volunteer firefighters.

SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:

Section 1. Repeal subdivision 217 (f) of the general municipal law.

Section 2. Overrides any provisions in local service award program plans
which implemented and enforced subdivision 217 (f) repealed by this act.

Section 3. Effective date.

JUSTIFICATION:  In 1988, article 11-a was added to the general municipal
law (gml) to authorize municipalities and fire districts to establish
Length of Service Award Programs (LOSAPs). Presently, approximately 600
such plans are operated in New York to incent recruitment and retention
of volunteer firefighters. Although the service awards provided pursuant
to LOSAPs are related to credits earned annually by performing various
volunteer firefighter functions for a period of years and are paid on a
monthly basis upon the participating volunteer reaching a certain age,
LOSAPs are not "pension plans" and the receipt of such awards are not
              

"pension benefits" for any federal or state purposes.

The extensive commitment to preparation for and active participation in
providing emergency services to one's community is not, in any real
sense, recompensed by the availability of small LOSAP payments to long-
serving, dedicated volunteers but it may be perceived as minimal incen-
tive to commence and to continue undertaking such training and providing
essential public service.

Subdivision 217 (f) of the gml, ineffectually and unfairly penalizes all
public employees who serve their state or community as paid civil serv-
ants and separately as volunteer firefighters. Section 217 (f) of the
gml precludes a volunteer firefighter who provides firefighter services
(generally emergency services) during his or her "regularly assigned
work periods" from receiving LOSAP credit for those services. So, in
spite of the increasingly desperate need to attract folks willing to
undergo hundreds of hours of required training and stay active for many,
many years to earn any marginally-significant LOSAP benefits, public
employees are "disincented" from providing volunteer firefighter
services for circumstances over which they have no control and which may
already cause them significant employment-related penalties. Individual
public employees have no control over whether their employer will allow
them to respond to a structural fire in their community during their
'regularly assigned work period' what leave credits will be charged for
their absence from work, whether additional ("make-up") work will be
required of them or any other issues under the exclusive control of

their public employer. In order for a public employee to earn State or
NYC pension credit for hours worked or leave credits used, those hours
must be reported to the respective pension system; "regularly assigned
work periods" have no meaning or relevance to pension credit accrual or
employer reporting.

Individual volunteer firefighters have no control over when their commu-
nity will need to access their trained and sometimes life risking
skills. The administration of a LOSAP plan cannot, rationally be contin-
gent upon fire officers questioning each volunteer in the aftermath of a
fire emergency as to whether they had reported for duty during a 'regu-
larly assigned work period" as a public employee and then reporting this
to a plan administrator. Therefore, it is highly likely that this exist-
ing law "is honored more in its breach than its observance". Two volun-
teer firefighters responding side-by-side to an emergency in their
community should earn the same LOSAP credits for doing so without a
penalty being imposed upon one who is a public servant who may or may
not be a participant in a pension system and who will be subject to
whatever constraints, sanctions or requirements a public employer may
impose in relation to their time away from work.

Diligent research has failed to disclose similar public employee penal-
ties in other states which have LOSAP programs except to note that New
Jersey initially had a virtually identical provision in their LOSAP law
but promptly repealed it after a couple of years because it was ineffec-
tual and ufair, New Jersey Public Law 2001 Chapter 272. Subdivision 217
(f) is unfair, ineffectual and antithetical to the public policy
embodied in the remainder of article 11-a of the gml; it should be
repealed.

LEGISLATIVE HISTORY: New bill.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS: None.

EFFECTIVE DATE: Immediately.