Official misconduct

Official misconduct

OATH Index Nos. 1679/13, 1680/13, 1681/13

Two job center directors and a deputy director were charged with improperly transferring cases from other job centers in order to increase their own center’s job placement statistics.

The employees admitted that they participated in the scheme but that they did so under pressure of meeting agency-wide goals. OATH Administrative Law Judge John B. Spooner found that the employees had violated agency rules.

Judge Spooner denied the employees’ motion to dismiss a portion of the charges as time-barred, finding respondents’ conduct fell within the crimes exception to the 18-month limitations period in §75 of the Civil Service Law, i.e, the employees had committed the crimes of official misconduct and computer tampering.

ALJ Spooner recommended dismissal of charges that respondents violated the Conflicts of Interest Law since there was no proof that they gained a private or personal advantage from the transfers.

As to the penalty to be imposed, the ALJ recommended termination of employees’ employment as their participation in the scheme for as long as three years “was an egregious violation of the trust placed in them as managers, as well as their fundamental responsibility as civil servants.”  

The decision is posted on the Internet at: 

http://archive.citylaw.org/oath/10_Cases/13-1679.pdf

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Former Lt. Gov. Ravitch to Address Fiscal Challenges Facing Local Governments

Former Lt. Gov. Ravitch to Address Fiscal Challenges Facing Local Governments

Former New York State Lieutenant Governor Richard Ravitch will deliver a talk on “The Fiscal Challenges Facing Local Governments” for the 2014 Edwin L. Crawford Memorial Lecture on Municipal Law, to be held at Albany Law School on Tuesday, April 22, 2014, at 4:00 p.m.

The event, hosted by the law school’s Government Law Center (GLC), will also include a book signing for Ravitch’s new book, So Much to Do: A Full Life of Business, Politics, and Confronting Fiscal Crises.

Ravitch, an attorney who served as the state’s 75th lieutenant governor from 2009 to 2010, has served as chair of the New York State Urban Development Corporation, HRH Construction Corporation, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Bowery Savings Bank. He has also served as co-chair of the Task Force on the State Budget Crisis, which analyzed the fiscal sustainability of six states, including New York.

The lecture is free and open to the public.

To register, or for more information, contact agunn@albanylaw.eduor telephone 518-445-2329.

The GLC established the Edwin L. Crawford Memorial Lecture on Municipal Law in 1996 to honor the memory of Edwin L. Crawford, former executive director of the New York State Association of Counties. The program strives to educate and promote dialog on important and timely issues affecting local governments.

The Crawford Lecture was originally endowed with a generous grant from Saratoga Associates. This year’s program is also being co-sponsored by the New York State Association of Counties, the Association of Towns of the State of New York, and the New York State Conference of Mayors.
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Employee’s purported unresponsive answers to interrogatories used as a defense in disciplinary action

Employee’s purported unresponsive answers to interrogatories used as a defense in disciplinary action

OATH Index No. 876/14

The employer moved to preclude the employee from offering a defense to disciplinary charges based upon employee’s purported unresponsive answers to interrogatories.

OATH Administrative Law Judge Faye Lewis denied the employer’s motion explaining that interrogatories are an extraordinary discovery device, permissible only upon application for good cause shown.*

Under OATH’s rules of practice, the failure to comply with a discovery order may result in sanctions, including preclusion of evidence. Here, however, Judge Lewis found that the employee did not fail to comply with a discovery order. Rather, said the ALJ, the employee voluntarily answered the interrogatories, albeit not to employer’s satisfaction.

* Although Civil Service Law Section §75 does not provide for discovery in connection with a disciplinary hearing, Education Law §3020-a provides for demanding a “bill of particulars”. A contract disciplinary procedure negotiated pursuant to the Taylor Law may provide for “discovery.”

The decision is posted on the Internet at:

http://archive.citylaw.org/oath/11_Cases/14-876md.pdf
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Nonresident attorney's right to practice law in New York State

Nonresident attorney's right to practice law in New York State

Schoenefeld v. State of New York, et al., USCA, 11-4283-cv

The U.S. District Court, Northern District of New York, held that Section 470 of the Judiciary Law, which requires nonresident attorneys to maintain an “office for the transaction of law business” within the state of New York in order to practice in New York courts, places an impermissible burden on Ms. Schoenefeld’s fundamental right to practice law and that the state “failed to establish either a substantial state interest advanced by [the statute], or a substantial relationship between the statute and that interest” [Schoenefeld v. New York, 907 F. Supp. 2d 252, (N.D.N.Y. 2011)].

The State appealed and the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, certified the following question to the State’s Court of Appeals:

Under New York Judiciary Law Section 470, which mandates that a nonresident attorney maintain an "office for the transaction of law business" within the state of New York, what are the minimum requirements necessary to satisfy that mandate?

The Circuit panel retained jurisdiction to decide the case “once we have the benefit of the views of the New York Court of Appeals or once that court declines to accept certification."

The Second Circuit Court’s ruling is posted on the Internet at:

http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/7ad54af4-96b8-488a-b70c-22bc07f8de82/7/doc/11-4283_opn.pdf#xml=http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/7ad54af4-96b8-488a-b70c-22bc07f8de82/7/hilite/
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Perceived disability

Perceived disability
Widomski v. Orange County Community College*
Source: Justica Daily Summaries- Education

Plaintiff filed suit against OCCC, alleging claims of discrimination on the basis of a "perceived disability" and retaliation in violation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq.

The district court concluded that plaintiff, who was enrolled in OCCC's medical Laboratory Technology program, failed to establish that OCCC perceived his shaking hands to substantially limit a major life activity, and granted the motion for summary judgment in favor of OCCC as to the ADA discrimination claim.

The district court also granted summary judgment in favor of OCCC on the retaliation claim because plaintiff had not presented any evidence that OCCC's good faith belief that plaintiff had falsified documents was a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for the disciplinary referral.

The court concluded that plaintiff failed to demonstrate that OCCC perceived him as having an impairment that substantially limited a major life activity; plaintiff failed to demonstrate that OCCC's explanation for its decision to bring disciplinary proceedings against him was pretext for retaliation; and plaintiff's remaining arguments were without merit.

Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.

* USCA, 2^nd Circuit. The decision is posted on the Internet at:

http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/5e9e16b6-b8c0-43c6-b8d8-4adfffde611b/6/doc/13-1367_opn.pdf#xml=http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/5e9e16b6-b8c0-43c6-b8d8-4adfffde611b/6/hilite/
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