NY lawmakers at special Assembly session pass bills outlawing noncompete agreements, protecting Hudson River
New York state lawmakers passed bills on Tuesday that would outlaw employee noncompete agreements and spare the Hudson River from nuclear waste dumping.
If approved by Gov. Hochul, the noncompete agreement bill could have expansive effects: About 44% of employers statewide subject some workers to noncompete agreements, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit.
“Noncompete agreements are bad for workers, bad for consumers and bad for the economy,” Sen. Sean Ryan, the Buffalo Democrat who sponsored the bill in the state Senate, said in a triumphant statement.
He predicted the bill would increase worker mobility and help employers find candidates.
The Assembly passed the measure by a 95-to-49 vote over opposition from Republicans, who said the bill reached too far and should have carried exceptions for sophisticated industries.
“I certainly understand that a Chipotle worker should not have to go into court to throw out a noncompete agreement,” Assemblyman Edward Ra, a Long Island Republican, said on the floor of the Assembly.
But he added: “A blanket prohibition is too strong an action here.”
Assemblywoman Latoya Joyner, a Bronx Democrat and the legislation’s sponsor in her chamber, emphasized that employers could still enforce confidentiality agreements.
Later in the day, lawmakers approved a bill to ban the discharge of nuclear waste water into the Hudson River from the decommissioned Indian Point power plant in Buchanan. The legislation passed 100 to 44.
The bills made it through the state Assembly after the chamber launched into a two-day special session to finish work that went unresolved in the Legislature’s regular session, which ended June 10.
The Senate has adjourned for the season, but the Assembly is still working its way through legislation that passed the upper chamber.
On Tuesday, Assembly lawmakers did not address some bills that New York City advocates had hoped would make it to a vote — including legislation to give the city the power to lower its own speed limits. But legislators are due to return Wednesday for a final day of lawmaking.
In an expected victory for criminal justice advocates, the Assembly on Tuesday approved tweaks to a bill that would allow appeals of wrongful convictions by New Yorkers who pleaded guilty.
The legislation, the latest in a series of Albany criminal justice reforms, follows close behind a bill that would seal the criminal records of some New Yorkers who have served their time.
During the regular session, lawmakers also passed legislation to create a commission on reparations, move certain elections outside New York City to even years and implement controversial changes to the state’s campaign finance laws.
A last-minute push by Albany’s ruling Democrats to address the state’s crippling housing crisis came up short, leaving party leaders grumbling at each other anew after housing went largely unaddressed in April budget negotiations.
Hochul, a Democrat, is expected to address housing outside of the legislative process through piecemeal executive orders.
Street safety advocates have pushed the Assembly to consider Sammy’s Law, a bill that would allow the city to set speed limits as low as 10 mph on some streets, and as low as 20 mph citywide. The bill passed the state Senate by a bipartisan 55-to-7 vote this month, but has faced outerborough opposition in the Assembly.
Hochul said Tuesday that 839 bills had headed to her desk so far, including some 500 in the last week of the session.
“I’ll be looking at all bills very closely with my team and analyzing them and doing the right thing,” Hochul told reporters in Albany. “I have to read every single one.”
