New Hyde Park officials raise own health costs

Timothy Meyer

The New Hyde Park Village Board passed a resolution at Tuesday night’s meeting that will oblige elected and appointed officials to pay a larger percentage of their health care premiums and work longer to gain vested retirement benefits. It also eliminates medical insurance for newly appointed part-time officials.

Among changes in the health coverage, the vesting period for elected and appointed village officials will increase from five to 10 years.

Village of New Hyde Park Mayor Daniel Petruccio said the vesting period was calculated by how many hours village officials put in annually.

“If you added up all the hours we put in over the course of the year, it takes about three years serving on the board to equal one year of service for vesting,” Petruccio said.

With the new resolution in place, it will now take an elected official or appointed officials approximately thirty years to qualify for medical insurance for retirement benefits.

The change does not pertain to elected officials or appointed officers who assumed their position before April 10, 2010.

Elected officials and appointed officers will be required to start paying an increase to health care premiums starting June 1. Their contributions will start at 10 percent of premium costs in the first year, increasing to 15 percent in 2012 and 20 percent in 2013.

New full-time appointed officials will pay 10 percent for their premiums with no annual increases.

Any appointed part-time officials who assume their position after April 10, 2010 will not be entitled to medical insurance coverage or to the vesting of medical benefits in retirement.

Petruccio said many part-time employees have medical insurance outside of the village, and that it will save the village money.

Trustee Donald Barbieri said that he has spoken with state Sen. Jack Martins, Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy, and U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, about the ongoing progress of the Jericho Turnpike construction project that has being done by the Village of New Hyde Park and state Department of Transportation.

“I was told by DOT representatives that they will submitting their final comments on the project, as soon as next Monday,” Barbieri said. “The comments still need to be reviewed by our landscaping department, but we are closing in on the finish line.”

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