BILL NUMBER: S4554

SPONSOR: SCARCELLA-SPANTON
 
TITLE OF BILL:

An act to amend the administrative code of the city of New York, in
relation to the verification of participation in the rescue, recovery,
and clean-up operations at the site of the World Trade Center terror
attacks on September 11, 2001

 
PURPOSE:

This bill creates efficiencies in World Trade Center disability and
death benefit application process by allowing the New York City Police
Pension Fund to rely on a properly filed Notice of Participation to
prove the requisite criteria.

This bill also makes technical corrections relating to the name of the
New York City Police Pension Fund.

 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:

              

Section 1: Establishes a presumption that a New York City Police Pension
Fund member participated in the rescue, recovery, and clean-up oper-
ations at the World Trade Center, unless their employer proves the
contrary by competent evidence.

Section 2: This act shall be deemed to take effect immediately upon
enactment. Any member of the New York City Police Pension Fund who were
previously denied benefits must reapply.

 
JUSTIFICATION:

It is almost a quarter of a century since thousands of uniformed offi-
cers of the NYPD joined with fellow first responders in the wake of the
worst attack on American soil. As time continues to pass since September
11, 2001, those participants continue to develop impairments and disa-
bilities as a direct result of their exposures to airborne toxins.

Twenty years ago, Chapter 93 of the Laws of 2005 was enacted to
"presumptive accidental disability retirement related to exposure in
connection with the World Trade Center tragedy of September 11, 2001,
for certain public employees." The legislature overwhelmingly adopted
the measure, with only two of 194 members of the combined Assembly and
Senate voting no. The bill highlighted the need in its justification:

Early statistics indicate that these workers were exposed to numerous
hazards which may have, and may, impact on their health in the years to
come. If any public employee was exposed to these hazards and can no
longer perform their jobs, even after retirement, this legislation will
permit them to apply for an accidental disability retirement subject to
the respective Retirement System review process by proving, by competent
evidence, that the illness or injury was caused in connection with expo-
sure to any elements at the World Trade Center site. It is beyond ques-
tion that the State must recognize the services that these individuals
provided not only to the victims and their families, but to all citizens
of the City and State of New York and the United States of America. As a
result, it is only fitting that they be protected when a disability

ensues because of their selfless acts of bravery working at the World
Trade Center site and other sites.

As a requirement of the World Trade Center Disability Law, which was
amended in 2008 to include presumptive death benefits, eligible members
of the public retirement systems in New York State must file a sworn
written statement on a form provided by their retirement system, known
as a Notice of Participation, stating the dates and locations wherein
they participated in rescue, recovery, or clean-up operations. To be
afforded the presumption to apply for death or disability benefits, the
member must have completed 40 hours of participation at the World Trade
Center Site, as defined in the Retirement and Social Security Law, or in
the first iteration of the law, sustained a documented physical injury
in the first 48 hours (this was later amended to mere presence at the
Site in the first 48 hours). Initially, all Notices of Participation
were required to be filed with retirement systems by June 14, 2007,
however, this legislative requirement was amended several times. The
last filing extension was enacted in 2023, unanimously passed in the
Assembly and Senate, with a current deadline of September 11, 2026.

To apply for a World Trade Center benefit, the member or their benefici-
ary must first file a Notice of Participation. Simultaneously with a
medical review, the NYPD verifies the member's participation with
assistance from the Police Pension Fund. At such times, the applicant
must provide their own employment records to prove their affidavit for
participation is true and accurate.

The passage of time is making it increasingly difficult for retirees and
their families to locate records to which they may never even have had
possession. To assist applicants and their families, the New York City
Police Pension Fund works with the NYPD to search images of over one
million pages of employment records from September 11, 2001, through
September 12, 2002, but the scan quality of such images does not allow
for efficient searches. The effort to verify a member's participation
can accept to 18 months if their participation can even be verified.
Moreover, physical records, including backup copies of scanned records,
continue to be lost or destroyed in natural disasters including Super-
storm Sandy and a warehouse fire.

We can no longer require sick and dying members and their families to
endure a delay in the award of benefits. The months that it can take to
search through records directly correlates to a loss of benefits, as the
increased financial benefit is only provided upon approval of the appli-
cation.

Allowing a rebuttable presumption that the contents on a member's sworn
Notice of Participation are true and accurate will permit efficiencies
to be realized, while still maintaining integrity of the process. A
search for employment records will still be undertaken, however, to
ensure that a member did not mispresent statements of fact in their
Notice of Participation. Shifting the burden to the NYPD to rebut the
presumption of verification allows a limited review without unnecessar-
ily elongating the process as records continue to be harder to locate.

 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

See the Fiscal Note.