Adult Alert System. Recently, a Syracuse woman who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease left her home in the middle of the night and, with the help of several good Samaritans, traveled all the way to her former home in New Haven, Connecticut. Medical authorities were only alerted after she discovered someone living in her former house and became disoriented. This incident and others like it demonstrate the need for a missing vulnerable adult alert system for cognitively impaired residents similar to the “Amber Alert” system. Legislation was introduced this year to create an alert system to find missing individuals age 18 or older who have any cognitive impairment, mental disability or brain disorder. The Commissioner of the Department of Criminal Justice would be authorized to develop a system that local law enforcement personnel could promptly activate upon confirmation of a report of a missing vulnerable adult. The system would provide for the distribution of the name, description, and other pertinent information about the missing individual to broadcast media outlets, internet service providers and commercial mobile service providers in such a manner as to ensure that it is not revealed to the public that the missing person is vulnerable. These entities would voluntarily provide details of the missing individual to the public. This bill has passed the Assembly and is awaiting action in the Senate.

Long-term Care Worker Training Pilot Program. New York State has some 3.2 million persons age 60 and older, who make up 17% of the state’s population. With this statistic, many communities are challenged by increasing numbers of older adults who need supportive services, such as recreation, income assistance, transportation, and wellness education, and who have long-term chronic health problems that require home health care, supportive housing, or institutional care. Many areas of the state face problems recruiting and retaining skilled front-line workers, as well as specialists with knowledge of the particular social and medical needs of older adults, and especially lack the resources of “state of the art” education and training programs. The Assembly passed legislation to provide a long-term care worker training pilot program, which shall be established in the office for the aging. This bill would expand access to quality training for long-term care workers to improve the quality of care available to seniors and improve access to care in high need areas of the State. This bill is awaiting action in the Senate.

Economic Development to Grant Matching Funds. New York State continues to lag behind the rest of the country, particularly our Northeast neighbors, in economic growth. Had New York’s economy grown at the national average, we would have added nearly 500,000 new jobs. Much of the growth occurred in the down-state regions where nearly 80 percent of the new jobs were created during the last year. Yet despite New York State’s mediocre performance there is much to build on. Legislation has been introduced (A.2934) to authorize the Commissioner of Economic Development to grant matching funds to eligible applicants to implement regional marketing programs. The purpose of this bill is to stimulate and encourage economic activity in each region of the State. This bill passed the Assembly and is awaiting action in the Senate Commerce, Economic Development and Small Business Committee.

Job Development Authority to Create Incentive Program. Small and medium-sized corporations seeking to export products find it virtually impossible to secure financing when the sale of a product involved is to a foreign customer. The primary reasons that such funds have been unavailable is that the processing of such a loan involved high overhead costs because of the need to evaluate the foreign customer and estimate the fluctuations of foreign currencies and other variables involved in an export sale. The Assembly passed legislation (A.4881) which would provide a pool of money which the banking organization can invest in as it chooses and use the income from such investment to subsidize the cost of small loans to medium and small-sized exporters. The legislation also requires that at least two times the amount of money placed with the bank shall be lent out to these small and medium-sized firms. The intention of this bill is to make New York exporters more competitive in the world market. The bill is awaiting action in the Senate.

Rates Charged to Volunteer Companies. Our volunteer fire and ambulance companies provide lifesaving services to the community with their members answering the emergency bell at any time, day or night. To that end, we should ensure that volunteer fire and ambulance companies are able to receive the lowest cost electric rates available. Legislation was introduced in both houses which would include volunteer fire and ambulance companies amongst those volunteer organizations for which a utility may only charge residential rates. This bill is awaiting consideration in the Assembly Energy Committee and the Senate Energy and Telecommunications Committee.

Emergency Service Vehicle Operators Exempt from CDL Requirements. In law, Commercial Drivers License (CDL) requirements were exempt in emergency situations when only to provide emergency medical services. Legislation was passed in both houses (A.6051-A) that would allow our emergency responders use of fire apparatus, without CDLs, for things such as, but not limited to, drills, training, fire inspection, public education, public events and maintenance. This legislation will help to ensure improved training for our emergency responders. This bill was signed by the Governor (Chapter 36 of 2009).

Financial Incentive for Farmers and Local Government. Currently for qualified farms, the State provides assistance payments to help fund up to 75 percent of the cost of conservation easements purchased by counties and municipalities pursuant to a county or municipal farmland protection plan. To encourage more participation in the State’s agricultural and farmland protection program by farmers, counties and municipalities, legislation was sponsored by Assemblyman Magee (A.6686) which would increase the amount the State will contribute toward the cost of the acquisition of conservation easements from 75 to no more than 87.5 percent, only if the proposed match is a landowner contribution. This bill also provides added financial incentive for farmers and local governments to participate in the program. Farmers that do participate in the state grant program are committed to protecting their land and the funds that they receive are essential to sustaining the farm business and providing security for their future. This bill has passed the Assembly and is currently pending in the Senate Finance Committee.

Reinvestment Orchards and Vineyards Tax Exempt. New York is a leader in apple and grape production and in order to maintain and expand the strength of these agricultural sectors, farms must be able to continually meet challenging consumer tastes. Farmers must continually replant orchards and vineyards with new varieties to continue to grow, and unfortunately it is an expensive process. The legislature has realized that new replanting of orchard and vineyards do not generate income for farms and the Assembly passed legislation (A.915-A) which would create a program where farms are exempt from property taxes on qualified replanted acres for the first six years. The current administration of the program has made it burdensome for farmers to participate. This bill would amend this administration process so that farms would only need to file a soil group worksheet once with an assessor. Every year thereafter, the farmer would simply need to notify the assessor of new acreage planted to be eligible for the program. This bill is awaiting action in the Senate Agriculture Committee.

Military Voter to Apply for a Military Ballot. The federal Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act was enacted in 1986 to promote the opportunity for military and other overseas voters to timely apply for and obtain paper ballots that will be cast and counted. According to the United States Election Assistance Commission, in 2006 only 26.5 percent of the roughly 1 million absentee ballots requested by military and overseas Americans were cast and counted. In order to promote voting by military personnel, legislation was introduced to make permanent a current law affecting military voters that would otherwise expire December 31, 2009, to make it easier for both military and other overseas voters to apply for and obtain a paper ballot for primary, general and special elections and to expand the time frame for returning such ballots. Extending the time to receive military and other overseas ballots will better ensure that no American living overseas will be disenfranchised in New York because of the distance and time it takes to send mail from the far corners of the world. This legislation was signed by the Governor (Chapter 165 of 2009).

Helping Service-Disabled Veterans Who Are Owners of Businesses. Many of the service-disabled veterans who are returning to our state from their military service in Iraq and Afghanistan are starting businesses throughout the state. To assist in that, legislation is one step in helping these men and women in achieving their dream of becoming successful business owners, especially in light of these economic times. Legislation was passed (A.8555-A) to help service-disabled veterans who are owners of businesses increase their ability to partake in the procurement process. This bill has passed both houses and is awaiting action by the Governor.

New York First. In order to further the prosperity of individual companies and the overall economic development of the state, companies in New York that can provide services and products necessary to carry out research and development activities funded by the state should be considered for appropriate contracts. Legislation was introduced (A.250) and passed by both houses which would make sure that companies in New York State are considered when research institutions or other entities receiving state research and development funds enter into contracts for services or products necessary to implement the project for which funds are awarded. This bill has been delivered to the Governor.

Strengthening Roadway Safety in New York. According to a 2008 publication by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA), a significant percentage of junior drivers are involved in traffic accidents and are twice as likely as adult drivers to be in a fatal accident. NHTSA has encouraged states to implement a graduated licensing system (GDL) to ease young, inexperienced drivers onto the roadways, as an effective way of reducing the incidence of traffic accidents. Legislation was passed by both houses (A.8568) which would significantly strengthen New York’s GDL and implement additional enhancements as well. This bill would help limit driver distraction and inattention by prohibiting any operator in the state from using any portable electronic device while driving, and in turn, enhancing highway safety. This bill has been signed by the Governor (Chapter 403 of 2009).