NEW YORK STATE ASSEMBLY MEMORANDUM IN SUPPORT OF LEGISLATION submitted in accordance with Assembly Rule III, Sec 1(f)
BILL NUMBER: A9916
SPONSOR: Tague TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the public officers law, in relation to waiving the
residency requirement for certain county attorney positions within
Greene county
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
This bill will allow non-residents of Greene County to hold the office
of assistant public defender of the county of Greene.
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:
Section one of this bill amends section three of the public officers law
to permit a person residing in Greene County, or an adjoining county, to
hold the office of assistant public defender of the county of Greene.
Section two provides the effective date.
JUSTIFICATION:
Greene County recently requested this legislation to allow the hiring of
an attorney from an adjoining county to serve as assistant public defen-
der. With some exceptions, current New York State law requires that
assistant public defenders reside in the county in which they practice.
As a rural county of less than 50,000 people, there are a limited number
of attorneys who practice criminal law who reside in Greene County -
those that do, would rather work in private practice. As such, Greene
County is finding it difficult to hire an additional assistant public
defender to meet caseload demand and is therefore asking that the County
be afforded the opportunity to expand its candidate pool to neighboring
areas.
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
New bill.
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS FOR STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS:
None.
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect immediately.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
9916
IN ASSEMBLY
April 26, 2024
___________
Introduced by M. of A. TAGUE -- read once and referred to the Committee
on Governmental Operations
AN ACT to amend the public officers law, in relation to waiving the
residency requirement for certain county attorney positions within
Greene county
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Section 3 of the public officers law is amended by adding a
2 new subdivision 75 to read as follows:
3 75. In the county of Greene, the provisions of this section requiring
4 a person to be a resident of the political subdivision or municipal
5 corporation of the state for which such person shall be chosen or within
6 which their official functions are required to be exercised, shall not
7 prevent a person from holding the office of assistant public defender of
8 the county of Greene, provided that such person resides in a county
9 adjoining Greene county within the state of New York; provided, however
10 that any person performing such functions or holding such offices in any
11 other county shall be a resident of such county unless otherwise
12 provided by law. The provisions of this subdivision shall not apply to
13 any person holding the office of first assistant public defender, the
14 holder of which would assume the duties of the public defender upon the
15 public defender's absence from the county or upon the public defender's
16 inability to perform their duties.
17 § 2. This act shall take effect immediately.
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD15188-01-4
