Governor Paterson recently signed into law the amended bill regarding excused leave for breast and prostate cancer screening.  The most recent version of the bill stated explicitly that this leave was to be paid leave – something that the original 2007 bill did not do and which therefore allowed some public employers to claim that they did not have to pay for this leave.  All employers must now pay employees for up to four hours leave annually for those screenings.  As before, this leave cannot be charged to sick or personal leave.

The 2008 bill also expands the group of employees covered by this leave provision.  As of now, virtually all public employees are now covered, including any employee who works for a participating employer in the New York State and Local Employees’ Retirement System. 

This means that library employees are also now covered if the library is a part of the retirement system.