Requires every city or county social services district to provide a wearable or mobile phone-based panic button to each employee whose job responsibilities necessitate direct interaction with clients in a client's home.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
6987--A
2025-2026 Regular Sessions
IN SENATE
March 27, 2025
___________
Introduced by Sens. HARCKHAM, JACKSON, SKOUFIS -- read twice and ordered
printed, and when printed to be committed to the Committee on Social
Services -- recommitted to the Committee on Social Services in accord-
ance with Senate Rule 6, sec. 8 -- committee discharged, bill amended,
ordered reprinted as amended and recommitted to said committee
AN ACT to amend the social services law, in relation to providing panic
buttons to certain employees of city and county social services
districts
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. The social services law is amended by adding a new section
2 63 to read as follows:
3 § 63. Workplace safety equipment for social services employees. 1.
4 Every city or county social services district, as constituted by section
5 sixty-one of this title, shall be required to provide a panic button to
6 each employee whose job responsibilities necessitate direct interaction
7 with clients in a client's home.
8 2. Such panic button shall be a wearable or mobile phone-based button.
9 Mobile phone-based panic buttons may only be installed on employer-pro-
10 vided equipment, and wearable and mobile phone-based panic buttons shall
11 not be used to track employee locations except when the panic button is
12 triggered. Employees shall bear no cost for this equipment.
13 3. For the purposes of this section, "panic button" shall mean a phys-
14 ical or virtual button that when activated immediately initiates an
15 emergency response by contacting either the local 9-1-1 public safety
16 answering point ("PSAP") or a dedicated monitoring or security service
17 that is capable of promptly notifying the PSAP. Such panic button shall
18 provide employee location information, and result in the dispatch of
19 local law enforcement or emergency services to the employee's location.
20 4. Every city or county social services district shall develop a plan
21 to ensure that employees working in areas where panic button functional-
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD11369-03-5
S. 6987--A 2
1 ity may be limited or unavailable can receive timely assistance from
2 local law enforcement in the event of an emergency.
3 5. The commissioner of the office of children and family services
4 shall promulgate rules and regulations necessary to implement the
5 provisions of this section.
6 § 2. This act shall take effect one year after it shall have become a
7 law.
