§ 219-o. Funding. 1. The cost of a service award program including,
but not limited to, amounts necessary to fund benefits and to pay for
all necessary administrative services, shall be a charge against the
sponsor. The governing board of the sponsor annually shall appropriate
and pay to the administrator an amount sufficient to pay the cost of the
program. The cost of the program shall be determined annually by the
program actuary designated by the comptroller. The program actuary shall
select the interest rate, mortality tables and other appropriate
assumptions and methods to determine the cost of the program. The cost
of the program, if any, attributable to (a) years of ambulance service
rendered during the five years immediately preceding the adoption of the
program or (b) the conversion of the program pursuant to section two
hundred nineteen-i of this chapter, shall be paid over a period not to
exceed five years. The comptroller shall promulgate rules and
regulations prescribing the time and manner of payment of the cost of
the program.

2. (a) Before or after a service award program is adopted for the
volunteer ambulance workers of an ambulance company which contracts to
provide service to one or more political subdivisions other than the
prospective or actual sponsor of the program, the governing boards of
the sponsor and one or more of such other political subdivisions may
enter into agreements to apportion the cost of the program in any
equitable manner between the sponsor and such other political
subdivisions.

(b) No such agreement shall be entered into by a political subdivision
other than the sponsor unless a resolution authorizing the agreement is
approved by the affirmative vote of at least sixty percent of the
governing board of the political subdivision and a proposition
authorizing the agreement or amendment is approved at a referendum of
the electors of the political subdivision.

(c) The proposition authorizing the agreement or amendment shall be
submitted to referendum not less than thirty days and not more than
ninety days after the governing board votes to authorize the agreement
or amendment. Notice of the referendum shall be published at least once,
not less than fourteen days prior to the date of the referendum, in the
official newspaper of the political subdivision or, if the political
subdivision does not have an official newspaper, in one or more
newspapers having general circulation in the political subdivision.

(d) Any such agreement shall remain in effect until amended or
terminated by resolution and submission of a proposition to referendum
as provided in paragraphs (b) and (c) of this subdivision, but shall be
suspended with respect to any such political subdivision which ceases to
contract with the ambulance company or in the event the sponsor ceases
to contract with the ambulance company.

(e) The amount to be paid by a political subdivision under any such
contract shall be a charge against the political subdivision and shall
be paid to the sponsor. The governing board of the sponsor shall apply
the amount received under any such contract to reduce the amount that
would otherwise be raised for the program from the sponsor.