Senate Bill S5462

                            
                    S T A T E   O F   N E W   Y O R K
________________________________________________________________________

                                  5462

                       2009-2010 Regular Sessions

                            I N  S E N A T E

                               May 7, 2009
                               ___________

Introduced  by  Sen.  OPPENHEIMER -- read twice and ordered printed, and
  when printed to be committed to the Committee on Education

AN ACT to amend the education law, in relation to  exemptions  from  the
  reduction of school aid

  THE  PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, REPRESENTED IN SENATE AND ASSEM-
BLY, DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

  Section 1. Subdivision 7 of section 3604  of  the  education  law,  as
amended  by  section  31 of part B of chapter 57 of the laws of 2007, is
amended to read as follows:
  7. No district shall be entitled to any portion of such school  moneys
on  such  apportionment  unless  the  report of the trustees or board of
education for the preceding school  year  shall  show  that  the  public
schools  were actually in session in the district and taught by a quali-
fied teacher or by successive qualified teachers or by qualified  teach-
ers  for  not less than one hundred eighty days. The moneys payable to a
school district pursuant to section thirty-six hundred  nine-a  of  this
chapter  in  the current year shall be reduced by one one-hundred eight-
ieth of the district's total foundation aid for each day less  than  one
hundred  eighty  days  that the schools of the district were actually in
session, except that the commissioner may disregard such  reduction,  up
to five days, in the apportionment of public money, if he finds that the
schools  of the district were not in session for one hundred eighty days
because of extraordinarily adverse  weather  conditions,  impairment  of
heating  facilities,  insufficiency  of  water supply, shortage of fuel,
lack of electricity, natural gas leakage, unacceptable levels of  chemi-
cal  substances,  [or]  the  destruction  of a school building either in
whole or in part, OR, FOR THE  TWO  THOUSAND  EIGHT--TWO  THOUSAND  NINE
SCHOOL  YEAR,  CLOSURES  RELATED  TO  THE H1N1 (SWINE FLU) OUTBREAK THAT
REQUIRED THE SCHOOL'S CLOSURE TO PROTECT THE HEALTH, SAFETY AND WELL-BE-
ING OF ITS STAFF AND STUDENTS, and if, further, the  commissioner  finds
that  such district cannot make up such days of instruction by using for

 EXPLANATION--Matter in ITALICS (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
                      [ ] is old law to be omitted.
                                                           LBD11802-01-9
              

S. 5462                             2

the secondary grades all scheduled vacation days which  occur  prior  to
the first scheduled regents examination day in June, and for the elemen-
tary  grades  all  scheduled vacation days which occur prior to the last
scheduled  regents  examination  day  in  June. For the purposes of this
subdivision, "scheduled vacation days" shall  mean  days  on  which  the
schools  of the district are not in session and for which no prohibition
exists in subdivision eight of this section for them to be in session.
  S 2. This act shall take effect immediately and  apply  to  state  aid
payments for the 2008-09 school year.