ALBANY - Public employees will continue to be eligible to collect twice for the same injury, costing taxpayers millions of dollars each year.
An Assembly committee this week stopped a bill that would have given municipalities the right to have jury awards for the lost future earnings of injured employees reduced by the amount the worker would get from his disability pension. Private businesses can already do that.
The bill was blocked shortly after Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, appointed three new members to the committee. All three voted to put the bill “on hold,” giving opponents of the bill a one-vote margin and effectively rejecting the bill.
“As a result of this maneuver, the full Assembly will not even have the chance to consider this bill on the merits,” New York City Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo said. “Not only is it unfair to all local governments, it is also costing the taxpayers millions of dollars.”
In one case cited by the sponsors of the bill, New York City sanitation worker Mario Iazzetti injured his back when he slipped and fell on the floor of a city garage nearly 20 years ago. He was 40 at the time and retired on a disability pension that provides him with three-fourths salary benefits for the rest of his life. He's getting $1.14 million from the city pension over the course of his life and is also collecting an $800,000 jury award meant to compensate him for the same loss.
The law costs New York City alone $11 million annually and could potentially cost $166 million in future payouts, city officials said.
Republican Gov. George Pataki, Democratic Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, Republican New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and a host of cities, towns and counties were supporting the measure.
Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein, the committee's chairwoman, said neither she nor Silver had any idea how the three new members would vote on the bill or any other bill on the committee's agenda. The new members, Catherine Nolan, Ronald Canestrari and Deborah Glick, were added because there were three vacancies on the committee, two pending since January, she said.
“There was nothing nefarious about it,” Weinstein said. “But I understand how it can look like it was.”
She said the bill would not have passed out of committee even without the three new members because there were only 10 members supporting it. By Assembly rules, a bill requires 11 votes to move to the full Assembly, she said.
The bill was opposed by the New York State Trial Lawyers, a powerful voice in Albany.
The bill was blocked shortly after Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, appointed three new members to the committee. All three voted to put the bill “on hold,” giving opponents of the bill a one-vote margin and effectively rejecting the bill.
“As a result of this maneuver, the full Assembly will not even have the chance to consider this bill on the merits,” New York City Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo said. “Not only is it unfair to all local governments, it is also costing the taxpayers millions of dollars.”
In one case cited by the sponsors of the bill, New York City sanitation worker Mario Iazzetti injured his back when he slipped and fell on the floor of a city garage nearly 20 years ago. He was 40 at the time and retired on a disability pension that provides him with three-fourths salary benefits for the rest of his life. He's getting $1.14 million from the city pension over the course of his life and is also collecting an $800,000 jury award meant to compensate him for the same loss.
The law costs New York City alone $11 million annually and could potentially cost $166 million in future payouts, city officials said.
Republican Gov. George Pataki, Democratic Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, Republican New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and a host of cities, towns and counties were supporting the measure.
Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein, the committee's chairwoman, said neither she nor Silver had any idea how the three new members would vote on the bill or any other bill on the committee's agenda. The new members, Catherine Nolan, Ronald Canestrari and Deborah Glick, were added because there were three vacancies on the committee, two pending since January, she said.
“There was nothing nefarious about it,” Weinstein said. “But I understand how it can look like it was.”
She said the bill would not have passed out of committee even without the three new members because there were only 10 members supporting it. By Assembly rules, a bill requires 11 votes to move to the full Assembly, she said.
The bill was opposed by the New York State Trial Lawyers, a powerful voice in Albany.
The Citizens' Say
There are No comments posted.