NY State Senate Bill 2025-S7994

Senate Bill S7994

2025-2026 Legislative Session

Adds home care visits to existing provisions of law prohibiting health care employers from requiring a nurse to work more than such nurse's regularly scheduled work hours

download bill text pdf

Current Bill Status - In Senate Committee Labor Committee

Introduced
- In Committee Assembly
- In Committee Senate
- On Floor Calendar Assembly
- On Floor Calendar Senate
- Passed Assembly
- Passed Senate
Delivered to Governor
Signed By Governor

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Actions

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	Assembly Actions - Lowercase Senate Actions - UPPERCASE
May 15, 2025	referred to labor

2025-S7994 (ACTIVE) - Details

See Assembly Version of this Bill:: A8615
Current Committee:: Senate Labor
Law Section:: Labor Law
Laws Affected:: Amd §167, Lab L; amd §6510-e, Ed L

2025-S7994 (ACTIVE) - Summary

Adds home care visits to existing provisions of law prohibiting health care employers from requiring a nurse to work more than such nurse's regularly scheduled work hours, including regularly scheduled home care visits.

2025-S7994 (ACTIVE) - Sponsor Memo

                                 
BILL NUMBER: S7994

SPONSOR: RAMOS
 
TITLE OF BILL:

An act to amend the labor law and the education law, in relation to the
hours worked by nurses in home care settings

 
PURPOSE:

To restrict consecutive hours of required work by nurses in the home
care setting except in emergencies; does not prohibit a nurse from
voluntarily working overtime.

 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:

§ 1 of the bill amends section 167 of the labor law to add a facility
licensed or operated pursuant to article thirty-six of the public health
law to the definition of employer. Adds regularly scheduled home care
visits to the definition of Regularly scheduled work Hours. Adds Home
Care visits to the existing law that no health care employer shall
require a nurse to work more than that nurse's regularly scheduled work

hours or home care visits.

§ 2 of the bill amends section 6510-e of the education law to include
home care visits to the terminology.

§ 3 is the effective date

 
JUSTIFICATION:

Homecare nurses work in a demanding, stressful environment where proper
decision making is a critical function of the job. In 2008, legislation
limiting consecutive hours of work by nurses in other settings was
passed and signed into law. That legislation did not include homecare
settings (article thirty-six).

Through consultation with the borne care industry, this language was
developed to limit the consecutive hours of work by nurses in the home-
care setting. Understaffing has resulted in nurses working longer hours
caring for sicker, needier patients, and, in greater need of suitable
rest. Unscheduled, mandatory overtime is an unfair, additional burden
placed on a workforce, primarily female, with his or her own family and
childcare responsibilities to address. This bill would not prohibit
voluntary overtime assignment, but would allow nurses to take care of
their own family needs, and their own rest needs, without concerns for
charges of patient abandonment or patient neglect. This bill is intended
to improve the healthcare environment for patients and the working envi-
ronment for nurses and their families.

 
LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

2021-22: S4485A - Vetoed by the Governor (Memo.190)

2019-20: S5678 - referred to Labor

2017-18: A876 referred to Labor

2015-16: A1127 referred to Labor/S3100 referred to Labor
2013-14: A1632 referred to Labor/S1673 referred to Labor

2011-12: A410 referred to Labor/S5154 referred to Labor

2009-10: A6492 introduced/Died in Assembly Codes/S5016 Died Senate
Finance

 
FISCAL IMPACT:

The use of overtime to address staffing needs has resulted in increased
overtime costs. This bill should result in additional new hires at more
favorable rates.

 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
Shall take effect on the ninetieth day after becoming law.

2025-S7994 (ACTIVE) - Bill Text download pdf

                             
                     S T A T E   O F   N E W   Y O R K
 ________________________________________________________________________
 
                                   7994
 
                        2025-2026 Regular Sessions
 
                             I N  S E N A T E
 
                               May 15, 2025
                                ___________
 
 Introduced  by  Sen.  RAMOS  -- read twice and ordered printed, and when
   printed to be committed to the Committee on Labor
 
 AN ACT to amend the labor law and the education law, in relation to  the
   hours worked by nurses in home care settings
 
   THE  PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, REPRESENTED IN SENATE AND ASSEM-
 BLY, DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
 
   Section 1. Subdivision 1 of section 167 of the labor law,  as  amended
 by chapter 815 of the laws of 2022, is amended to read as follows:
   1. When used in this section:
   a.  "Health  care  employer"  shall  mean any individual, partnership,
 association, corporation, limited liability company  or  any  person  or
 group  of  persons  acting directly or indirectly on behalf of or in the
 interest of the employer, which provides health care services (i)  in  a
 facility licensed or operated pursuant to article twenty-eight AND ARTI-
 CLE THIRTY-SIX of the public health law, including any facility operated
 by the state, a political subdivision or a public corporation as defined
 by  section  sixty-six  of  the  general  construction law, or (ii) in a
 facility operated by the state, a  political  subdivision  or  a  public
 corporation  as defined by section sixty-six of the general construction
 law, operated or licensed pursuant to the mental hygiene law, the educa-
 tion law, the correction law, or section five hundred four of the execu-
 tive law.
   b. "Nurse" shall mean a registered professional nurse  or  a  licensed
 practical  nurse  as  defined  by article one hundred thirty-nine of the
 education law who provides direct patient care.
   c. "Regularly scheduled work  hours",  including  REGULARLY  SCHEDULED
 HOME  CARE VISITS, pre-scheduled on-call time and the time spent for the
 purpose of communicating shift reports regarding patient  status  neces-
 sary  to  ensure  patient  safety,  shall mean those hours AND HOME CARE
 VISITS a nurse has agreed to work and  is  normally  scheduled  to  work
 pursuant  to  the  budgeted  hours AND HOME CARE VISITS allocated to the
 
  EXPLANATION--Matter in ITALICS (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
                       [ ] is old law to be omitted.
                                                            LBD13095-01-5

 S. 7994                             2
 
 nurse's position by the health care employer; and if no such  allocation
 system  exists,  some  other  measure  generally used by the health care
 employer to determine when an employee is minimally  supposed  to  work,
 consistent  with the collective bargaining agreement, if any. Nothing in
 this section shall be construed to permit an  employer  to  use  on-call
 time as a substitute for mandatory overtime.
   §  2.  Section 6510-e of the education law, as added by chapter 493 of
 the laws of 2008, is amended to read as follows:
   § 6510-e. Nurses' refusal of overtime work. The refusal of a  licensed
 practical  nurse  or a registered professional nurse to work beyond said
 nurse's regularly scheduled hours of work, INCLUDING REGULARLY SCHEDULED
 HOME CARE VISITS, shall not solely  constitute  patient  abandonment  or
 neglect  except  under  the circumstances provided for under subdivision
 three of section one hundred sixty-seven of the labor law.
   § 3. This act shall take effect on the ninetieth day  after  it  shall
 have become a law.

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