LOBBY DAY REPORT: Lobby day turn-out to be very productive and the Legislators were receptive to our groups. Due to the efforts of the National 10-13 President Frank Martarella, Tony Perrone and the Hudson Valley 10-13 President Bart Foley and Rich Molloy, Senator Golden finally agreed to re-submit all five (5) of our old COLA Bills, which he has failed to do so for the past few years. These five bills have received new bill numbers BUT will not be able to move forward in Committees, until the Fiscal Notes from the NYS Retirement System and the NYC Actuary Office are submitted. The bill numbers are as follows:

- S-6047-2017 Five year additional (look-back) for older retirees
- S-6048-2017 Raises the Surviving Spouse COLA from 50% to 100%
- S-6049-2017 Reduces eligilbility age from 62 to 55 with 5 years of service
- S-6050-2017 Raises the maximum CPI from 3% to 5%
- S-6051-2017 Increases the COLA from 50% to 100% of CPI (not to exceed 3%)

LEGISLATIVE REPORT: Veterans Supplementation Bill / S-6505-2017 has been submitted by Senator Larkin with the revised date changes to cover all Veterans, who have an Honorable discharge for any military service, from World War Two forward, up the effective date of the Active Veterans Bill which was signed into law last year on May 21, 2016. Said Veterans shall be entitled to .25% for each month of active duty service for a maximum of 36 months which will equal a 3% pension supplement added into their pension.
- NOTE: Assemblyman DenDekker had already submitted the old bill without the revised date change and Senator Larkin’s Office is working with Assemblyman DenDekker’s Office to get the Assembly bill version amended to read the same and it will be assigned a new bill number shortly.
COLA Bill to raise the base calculation amount from the first $ 18,000.00 to the first $ 25,000.00:
S-3306 --- Senator Ritchie / A-6045 --- Assemblyman Steck
Senator Ritchie submitted the COLA Bill and the “ actuary fiscal notes “ show that due to the high cost of this bill approaching $ 2.6 BILLION dollars or more, that this bill will most likely never go anywhere with the present legislature. I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news by reporting reality of the potential demise of this long overdue and well deserved bill for retirees. Please contact your legislators ASAP !
Health Insurance Protection Bill:
No Senate bill number / A-5455 --- Assemblyman Steck
I confirmed with Senator Lanza’s Chief Legal Advisor that the Senator had submitted our “revised” Health Protection Bill to the Bill Drafting Department, along with the requested language corrections, which our membership worked very diligently on fine tuning every part of this bill to make this bill applicable to all NYS Public Service Retirees. In the old bill version many retirees would have been left out, had the previous version of the bill passed and was signed into law. We are awaiting a new bill number to be assigned. I will advise everyone of the bill number as soon as I receive it and Senator Lanza’s office, who will then confer with Assemblyman Steck with regards to making any necessary amendments to his bill to update and mirror the language changes. Senator Lanza’s office is hoping for a bill number by the end of the June 2017 Legislative session.

MISCELLANEOUS FYI:

CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION:
- The ALLIANCE and the RPA have unanimously, officially passed motions to OPPOSE THE CONSTITUTION CONVENTION and we encourage all retirees to do the same and have all your children, grandchildren and family members oppose it as well. Gov. Cuomo is already lining up Democratic supporters from New York City, to be the delegates and some of these delegates already work in the public sector thereby will essentially be double dipping with their salary and added pension benefits later. Gov. Cuomo will push the State Comptroller out and put in a team of political hacks to run the pension system and he will raid the pension system as if it is his “private bank of money” to give away. The word is that he will reduce pension benefits and crush older retirees financially. We can’t let this happen and shame on us if we do not educate everyone we know about the pitfalls of a Constitutional Convention and the negative effect it will have on all retirees, retiree health care, labor contracts and health insurance benefits for everyone. WE NEED EVERYONES HELP TO DEFEAT THIS IMPORTANT ISSUE !!!

PLEASE DO YOUR PART TO HELP US GET THE WORD OUT TO ALL YOUR FAMILY MEMBERS AND LEGISLATORS ! Now that the Legislature is about to go into “ summer recess “ and return to their respective home offices in their districts, this is the opportune time for everyone to contact their Senator and Assemblyman and voice your concerns over no piece of legislation being passed to help out well deserving retirees. The squeaky wheel gets the grease and the more calls each Legislator gets, the more inclined they are to move some of our bills forward and pass them. Please make sure to ask them to become a Co-Sponsor to our bills and if they refuse then please advise us and we will follow-up with that Legislator. If you need contact information for your Legislator then please email me at: bmk51@aol.com and I will provide you with that information.

OPINION: RETIREES CAN AND SHOULD BE THE CATALYST TO MOTIVATE ALL THEIR FAMILY AND FRIENDS, THAT IN ORDER FOR OUR RETIREES TO FINALLY BE TREATED FAIRLY IS BY TAKING BACK CONTROL OF OUR DYSFUNTIONAL NEW YORK STATE GOVERNMENT ! GOV. CUOMO SHOULD TAKE NOTICE OF THE RECENT NATIONAL ELECTION RESULTS AS HE RUNS AGAIN… RETIREES CAN AND SHOULD BEGIN THIS PROCESS OF DISEMINATING INFORMATION AHEAD OF THE 2018 ELECTION OF THEIR COMPLETE DISATISFACTION WITH GOV. CUOMO’S FISCAL MISMANAGAMENT AND TOTAL DISREGARD FOR RETIREES NEEDS, WELL FARE AND FINANCIAL STRESS IN GENERAL.

“ UNITED WE WILL PREVAIL --- DIVIDED WE WILL FAIL “

Legislative Report respectfully submitted by,
Bryant Kolner, RPA Legislative Representative & President of the Alliance of Public Retiree Organizations of New York