NYC Gives Unlimited Sick Leave to Employees With 9/11-Related Ills

An estimated 2,000 active New York City municipal employees with verified illnesses related to their work in the 2001 World Trade Center disaster will get unlimited sick leave, Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) and union leaders said.

The unlimited sick leave, provided in an Oct. 23 agreement with District Council 37 of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, will go to emergency medical technicians, police and patrol officers, laborers, engineers, and other employees across city agencies.

Exact figures weren’t available, but the leave policy will cost the city tens of millions of dollars over the next 15 years, mayoral spokesman Raul Contreras told Bloomberg Law.

The deal with DC 37, the second-largest city employees union, will form the basis for more agreements with unions representing other eligible employees, de Blasio said. The step shows the lasting costs of the 9/11 collapse and subsequent recovery and cleanup operations, as well as providing another indicator of the mayor’s close relationship with municipal employee unions.

The sick leave is retroactive to Sept. 11, 2001, the date of the terrorist attack. Leave used up since then will be restored if it’s verified as having been used for 9/11-related illnesses.

Eligible employees need not exhaust existing leave balances before they have access to the unlimited 9/11 sick leave, freeing them to use regular sick leave for any non-9/11 illness over the course of their employment, the city said. The amount of unlimited 9/11 sick leave used will be deducted from an employee’s accrued sick leave time remaining at retirement.