S 4837: Establishes a direct support wage enhancement to employees that provide direct care support or any other form of treatment, to individuals with developmental disabilities and whose income is less than $125,000.

  
  STATE OF NEW YORK ________________________________________________________________________ 4837 2025-2026 Regular Sessions  IN SENATE February 13, 2025 ___________ Introduced by Sen. FAHY -- read twice and ordered printed, and when printed to be committed to the Committee on Disabilities AN ACT relating to establishing a direct support wage enhancement to employees that provide direct care support or any other form of treat- ment, to individuals with developmental disabilities The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem- bly, do enact as follows: 1 Section 1. Direct support wage enhancement. 1. Notwithstanding any 2 other inconsistent provision of law, effective April 1, 2025, providers 3 licensed, funded, approved and/or certified by the office for people 4 with developmental disabilities to provide treatment, services and care 5 for individuals with developmental disabilities shall receive supple- 6 mental funding to enhance wages of employees that provide direct care 7 support or any other form of treatment, to individuals with develop- 8 mental disabilities and whose income is less than one hundred twenty- 9 five thousand dollars. 10 2. The commissioner of the office for people with developmental disa- 11 bilities, in consultation with the division of the budget, shall estab- 12 lish a list of eligible employee titles for such wage enhancement based 13 on the application of direct care to individuals with intellectual 14 and/or developmental disabilities. 15 3. Using the forms and processes developed by the commissioner of the 16 office for people with developmental disabilities under this section, 17 employers shall indicate the number of eligible employees based on the 18 list of eligible titles pursuant to subdivision two of this section. 19 4. The commissioner of the office for people with developmental disa- 20 bilities shall distribute an allocation to each eligible provider equiv- 21 alent to four thousand dollars per eligible employee based on the forms 22 developed pursuant to subdivision three of this section. 23 5. The funds distributed pursuant to this section must be used to 24 enhance base wages and benefits of eligible employees. 25 § 2. This act shall take effect April 1, 2025. EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets [ ] is old law to be omitted. LBD01000-01-5