2 Police Officers On Long-Term Disability Terminated By Town

SOUTHOLD, NY — The Southold town board voted to terminate two police officers, who have been on disability for years, at Tuesday night's meeting.

According to two resolutions passed, disciplinary charges were filed, a hearing officer conducted a review, and on June 26, rendered a decision that both town employees should be terminated from employment.

The two employees terminated were Southold Town Police Officers Joseph Wysocki, who has been on the force 23 years, and David Hunstein, a 14-year town employee — both men have been out on disability for years.

Southold Town labor counsel Richard Zuckerman told Patch, "To be clear, everyone wishes that these two police officers had not gotten hurt. Everybody wishes they could have come back to work full-time. Unfortunately, the doctors say they cannot come back to work full time and when you cannot come back to work full-time, you are not able to do your job. And that is why they were let go."

Both men hired their own attorney, Chris Rothemich of Islandia, rather than use union counsel. Rothemich did not immediately return a call for comment.

At his state of the town address in 2016, Southold Town Supervisor Scott Russell said the town had been slammed with $1.5 million in disability costs for the two police officers, who had been out after injuries on the job. That amount jumped to more than $2 million by the supervisor's 2017 state of the town address.

At that address, Russell said one of his top priorities for 2016 was disability reform.

Due to New York General Municipal Law, Section 207, police and firefighters who are out on disability are entitled to full salary, he said.

Wysocki, Russell said, had been out on disability leave since 2010 and, by that address, had received a total of $641,570, plus benefits, for a total of $950,000.

Meanwhile, Huntstein, Russell said, had been out on disability leave since 2012, had received $393,017 in salary, plus benefits, for a total of $600,000 by that time.

Under the current system, employees including police and firefighters out on disability receive full salary and benefits, and even raises, tax free, Russell said.

To that end, Russell would like to establish a time limit on disability leave. “Currently, the leave is open-ended, which can sometimes go on for years,” Russell said. “Establishing a limit of 24 months is more than enough time to determine if an officer is able to go back to active duty or not. If he or she can’t, disability retirement approval should be declared and the disability retirement application should be approved expeditiously.”

As it stands, the supervisor said, the applications had been pending for “months, with no answer” a situation that’s “not fair” to the officers, the current force, or to taxpayers.

Russell would also like to see an independent facilitator assigned to each case to ensure that the municipality and the insurer are providing all the medical resources necessary to help an officer get back to active services —and also, to “ascertain that the officer is taking all of the necessary steps to utilize those resources to rehabilitate and get back to active service. Penalties should be imposed should either party not meet its obligations,” Russell said.

Russell would also like to see New York State abolish the “tax free” status of the injured officer’s wage earnings, he said. “This serves absolutely no purpose. First, the officer is already assured of income and financial security during his leave under separate provisions of New York General Municipal Law Section 207. This appears to be nothing more than a contrivance established years ago to foster political goodwill with the police unions.”

Finally, the supervisor proposed the elimination of the state’s policy that says “once an employee has worked restricted/light duty for approximately two years, that assignment becomes the employee’s ‘job’ and so should be retired. The net result of that policy,” the supervisor said, “is that an employer that provides restricted/light duty to an employee for ‘too long’ will ‘own’ that employee until the employee’s retirement or death — unless a medical miracle occurs and the employee can return to full duty.”

While police and firefighters who are out on disability are entitled to full salary, "it's also tax-free. There is absolutely no reason why, and it is an outrage," Russell said, in an email after state of the town meeting.

"It insults all the people who work hard and pair their fair share of income taxes. This seems to be nothing more than a give-away by state legislators who want to buy the support of police unions with taxpayer money," the supervisor said in that past interview.

The costs to the town due to the officers' being out on disability increased to more than $2 million, Russell said at his state of the town address in 2017.

"Last year, I stood up here and said New York State needs revise its retirement and employment" system, he said, adding that the two police officers had been out on disability from 2010 and 2012, respectively, in Southold.

"When you calculate the costs", the total was $1.5 million last year, and more than $2 million this year, Russell said at his 2017 address, an increase of $600,000.

"If you cull the numbers out, that represents 1.79 percent of the tax increase," Russell said.

Terminating the two officers — who will still be paid under law until they either get well or retire — means the town will now be able to hire two officers to fill their spots and save on hefty overtime costs.

And, if either of the officers has not retired, or applied to retire, they would not receive their retiree health insurance.