STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
7574
2023-2024 Regular Sessions
IN SENATE
June 8, 2023
___________
Introduced by Sen. ADDABBO -- read twice and ordered printed, and when
printed to be committed to the Committee on Rules
AN ACT to amend the education law, in relation to establishing Diwali as
a school holiday in certain public schools
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. The education law is amended by adding a new section 2586-a
2 to read as follows:
3 § 2586-a. Diwali as a holiday in the public schools of the city of New
4 York. The fifteenth day of the eighth month of the Indian calendar in
5 each year, known as Diwali, is hereby made and declared to be a holiday
6 in all the public schools in the city school district in the city of New
7 York and such public schools shall not be in session on such day.
8 § 2. Subdivision 2-a of section 3635 of the education law, as amended
9 by chapter 424 of the laws of 2005, is amended to read as follows:
10 2-a. The superintendent of each city school district, in a city having
11 a population in excess of one million, shall prepare a public school
12 calendar and shall notify officials of nonpublic schools to which trans-
13 portation has been requested not later than the first day of June in
14 each year, of the days on which the public schools will be in session in
15 the following school year. Such school district which provides transpor-
16 tation to nonpublic schools shall provide such transportation for the
17 same number of days as the public schools are open but shall not provide
18 transportation services for more than one hundred eighty days. Offi-
19 cials of each nonpublic school to which transportation is provided by a
20 city school district of a city having a population in excess of one
21 million may notify such district, not later than the first day of July
22 of each school year, of a maximum of five days, exclusive of Saturdays,
23 Sundays or legal holidays upon which public schools are required to be
24 closed, on which the public schools are scheduled to be closed, except
25 that in any year in which the first or last day of Passover and Easter
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD11774-01-3
S. 7574 2
1 Sunday are separated by more than seven days, such officials may notify
2 the district of a maximum of ten days, but such school district will be
3 required to provide for transportation to such nonpublic school provided
4 that such five or ten additional days, whichever is applicable, are
5 limited to the following: the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday
6 after Labor Day, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, the week in which public
7 schools are closed for spring recess, December twenty-fourth and the
8 week between Christmas day and New Year's day, the Tuesday, Wednesday,
9 Thursday and Friday after the observance of Washington's birthday, the
10 fifteenth day of the eighth month of the Indian calendar in each year,
11 known as Diwali, and, in the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens only, Anni-
12 versary Day as designated in section twenty-five hundred eighty-six of
13 this chapter.
14 § 3. This act shall take effect on July 1, 2023.
