BILL NUMBER:S5265

TITLE OF BILL:  An act to direct the workers' compensation board to
establish and operate a video conferencing workers' compensation hearing
site in the city of Hornell, county of Steuben

PURPOSE:

To direct the Workers' Compensation Board to establish and operate a
video conferencing hearing site in the city of Hornell, county of Steu-
ben. The bill provides for a necessary video conferencing hearing site
for Workers' Compensation hearings and other related business in the
City of Hornell, County of Steuben, NY.

SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:

Section 1 requires that the Workers' Compensation Board shall establish,
maintain and operate a video conferencing hearing site for Workers'
Compensation hearings and other related business in the City of Hornell,
County of Steuben, NY.

Section 2 provides the effective date.

JUSTIFICATION:

In 2013 the Workers' Compensation Board closed its Customer Service
              

Center located at the Henderson-Smith office building (HSOB) in the City
of Hornell in Steuben County. At the time, this location was one of four
(4) locations in all of New York State that actually had Workers'
Compensation Board (WCB) hearings in a State-owned office building. The
HSOB has all the advantages of a new office space. It is conveniently
located, including excellent, clean and accessible space with no rent
paid to a private landlord, no natural gas or electric bills, custodial,
snow plowing, security, parking or air conditioning. Upon closing the
Hornell WCB site, the WCB has not shown to have had any actual savings.
Currently the space formerly used by the WCB in the HSOB is vacant.

Unlike nearly all other hearing sites at privately owned buildings, the
WCB was not required to pay rent to a private property owner for its
space at the HSOB. Importantly, unlike the Jamestown, Rochester and
Elmira hearing sites, the Hornell HSOB is accessible for rural-based
constituents living inside a catchment area with a diameter of 60-70
miles.These injured workers are now being forced to drive and appear in
Rochester, Jamestown or Elmira. Many of these disabled workers can't
afford a shorter drive to Hornell (they are not reimbursed for mileage
or parking).

In short, the WCB Hornell site closure mandate runs counter to Workers
Compensation Law Sec. 117 as the closure of the Hornell hearing site is
unreasonable and arbitrary. It deprives the injured worker access to
justice. While persons in the criminal justice system are able to all

have their case heard locally in every local county, currently, the same
local standards for fair hearings don't apply to New York State workers.

Steuben County is geographically larger than the State of Rhode Island.
Portions of Allegany and Livingston counties are included in the Hornell
catchment area. Thus the closure of this center forces hundreds of
injured workers and their representatives to travel to urban venues;
requiring in many instances over an hour to Elmira, an hour and one half
to Rochester or two hours to Jamestown. The closure of this office has
created a huge hardship for injured, disabled and handicapped workers
living in New York's Southern Tier as there is no easy access to hearing
sites for these individuals to obtain the assistance they need to secure
their workers' compensation benefits when they are injured.

Furthermore, at the time of the Hornell WCB site's closure, many times
the administrative judge and stenographer in Rochester who conduct the
hearings did not actually travel to Hornell. Instead, the hearings were
conducted electronically using teleconference facilities originating in
Rochester. All required infrastructure is still located in Hornell's
HSOB. Additionally, the City of Hornell has the capacity to offer its
City Hall building as an alternate videoconferencing hearing site. The
Hornell City Hall (HCH) and City Courtroom facility has all the advan-
tages of the HSOB as well as armed Steuben County Sheriff Department
security at the building.

All that is needed in Hornell is the availability of a handicapped
accessible building with security and videoconferencing ability. No
full-time personnel are needed. Both the HSOB and the HCH have those
capabilities and both buildings are inspected by the State for all
compliance with State and Federal regulations. In fact, HCH was
inspected by the WCB in 2014.

This bill makes it clear that only a videoconferencing site is being
designated in Hornell, not a WCB customer center. It is anticipated that
videoconferencing would be needed 2-3 working days per month in Hornell.

The closure of the Hornell WCB hearing site has created disproportionate
hardships in this region. Over the last twenty years, other workers'
compensation offices have closed in Wellsville and Belmont (Allegany
County), Bath and Corning (Steuben County) and Mount Morris (Livingston
County) leaving Hornell as the one existing hearing site, precisely
because of its location. Requiring injured, disabled and handicapped
workers to travel 65+ miles one way is a hardship that ought to be
avoided if possible.

This is a severe blow to rural services in the Southern Tier. The work-
ers' compensation system is often the only thing protecting our injured
workers from the certain financial failure, and the undeniable family
and psychological problems that inevitably follow joblessness and
resulting poverty.

This WCB Hornell site closure makes it difficult for those least able to
care for themselves by limiting their access to a fair hearing by forc-
ing rural residents who often have lower benefits than non-rural resi-
dents in the state, to navigate to the more urban areas for a fair hear-
ing at other sites.

Closing the Hornell WCB site has had a detrimental effect on the
injured, the disabled, the handicapped and the rural working poor; the
groups that the workers comp program strives to help.

This bill will ensure that those least able to care for themselves have
equal access to justice by providing a WCB hearing site in Hornell that
can be available each month to hear cases from residents in the region.

For all of the aforementioned reasons it is imperative that this bill
pass in order to provide essential serviced to the over 75,000 residents
of the Southern Tier catchment area.

LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

New bill.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

Minimal cost to the state.

EFFECTIVE DATE:

This act shall take effect immediately.