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Daily Point

Notes of praise

For those wondering how much Suffolk County Democratic Party chairman Rich Schaffer really supported vanquished Democratic District Attorney Tim Sini, a video circulating before the election contained some intriguing quotes.

They include Schaffer saying he had been "impressed" with Sini’s opponent, Ray Tierney, and noting that he and Tierney appeared together on the Conservative line for Schaffer’s reelection bid as Babylon Town supervisor.

"Tierney does have a really good resume and background," Schaffer said in the video, a PoliticsNY interview which posted Oct. 14. At another point he added, "Ray's gonna make it very competitive."

And about Sini?

"Our party has supported Tim Sini," Schaffer said in the video. "I'm not able to really talk about Sini's record, he's been investigating the Town of Babylon for the last three years so we're on our I think sixth or seventh round of subpoenas that have gone nowhere, but the lawyers advised me not to comment on Sini's candidacy or any of the work that he's done."

Schaffer went on: "But I can comment on Ray's work and I think Ray's been a terrific prosecutor on the federal level."

Tierney, who also previously worked in both the Suffolk and Brooklyn DA’s offices, is currently employed at Suffolk OTB as chief compliance and enforcement officer — a position he still holds as of Thursday, according to an OTB spokesman. The public benefit corporation’s board is appointed by the county legislature, over which the county’s party bosses exercise influence, though Schaffer tells The Point he did not have a role in offering Tierney the OTB job.

The party chair says he did, in fact, support Sini’s candidacy, contributing money to his campaign, coordinating and filing — through town committees — the petitions for Sini to get on the ballot as a Democratic candidate.

"I also collected my own signatures for him in my district where I was a committeeperson," Schaffer emailed.

— Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano

Talking Point

Prop 1 defeat’s redistricting kink

So far the tension on the state’s first-ever Independent Redistricting Commission has involved whether the Democrats and Republicans on the panel can and will agree on a single set of new lines for congressional, state Senate and state Assembly seats.

After Tuesday’s election, that tension remains.

Voters defeated the constitutional amendment, Proposal 1 — which could have suitably altered the deadlines for approving those submissions to state lawmakers.

According to ex-GOP State Sen. Jack Martins from Nassau County, vice chairman of the commission, the amendment’s popular rejection on Tuesday should, hopefully, keep the process less partisan than if it had passed. But whatever your view of the defunct proposal — derided by the GOP as "Democratic gerrymandering"-- the road ahead remains to be paved.

In this brand-new redistricting process, a new round of commission hearings, to get public response on separate sets of Democratic and Republican maps, has already begun.

The final hearing will be in Suffolk on Nov. 23. Given the holidays that follow, there could be a relatively short window for the commissioners to redraw, negotiate, and hopefully combine the rough maps already published. A plan or plans are due to be voted on and sent to the legislative houses by mid-January for lawmakers’ approval, rejection, or modification.

What may follow is extra tricky.

Jeff Wice, senior fellow at New York Law School’s Census and Redistricting Institute, notes that the failed amendment would have revised deadlines to assure the redistricting process would be done in time for petition filings and nominations for the coming June primary.

Now there is no such assurance. Whether there is a scheduling conflict, and what can be done about it, remains to be seen.

The problem only arises if the commission’s first submissions are rejected by the lawmakers — thus allowing the commission members to draw up and submit a revised set of maps on a schedule that could crash petition season.

To allow enough time, one solution could be to push state primaries back, he said. But the congressional primary is subject to a federal court order from 2012 requiring that it be held in June every two years. Delaying it could require a special federal court request. In this way, the map to a new way of mapping just got a bit harder to read.

— Dan Janison @Danjanison

Pencil Point

Out of control

For more cartoons, visit www.newsday.com/nationalcartoons

Final Point

Retiree medical melee mounts

Now that a judge has delayed a very difficult choice of medical benefits for an estimated quarter-million NYC service retirees, the question arises of what comes next — and what precedent it may set for other ex-government employees regionwide.

The politics, it is now clear, are shaped by an unusual scenario. Former medics, teachers, police, firefighters, sanitation workers and other ex-employees, who don’t want their top-notch lifetime coverage messed with, are confronting the combined forces of municipal unions and city officials.

As part of a negotiated deal reached earlier this year, the union-run Municipal Labor Committee agreed to let the mayor’s Office of Labor Relations shift the retirees’ benefits from a plan in which the city simply paid their premiums for Medicare. Retirees would be shifted to a Medicare Advantage Plan; their premiums would be paid for but the plan would have different rules, costs, copays and qualifications.

Those who wished to keep their current Medicare plan would have to sign up for it and pay $191 per month. The aim of the agreement is to save the system an estimated $600 million. In a Medicare Advantage Plan, insurance companies manage costs, in part by requiring preauthorization for certain procedures, establishing provider networks, and charging copays.

The NYC Organization of Public Service Retirees, led by former Babylon resident Marianne Pizzitola, sued in state Supreme Court, Manhattan, emphasizing that the MLC represents unions full of active workers — but not the interests of their retirees. Justice Lyle Frank rejected the MLC’s attempt to intervene.

The retirees’ lawyer Steve Cohen testified last week before the City Council’s Civil Service and Labor Committee. He argued that pushing his clients into the Medicare Advantage Plan violates what they were promised by contract and assured in the city’s administrative code.

"Members of the Committee, I ask that you do your due diligence," Cohen said. "What is the City trying to force on senior citizens and disabled retirees? Have you even seen the proposed contract? Have you asked (the de Blasio administration) can you just diminish vested retiree benefits to anything you want to? And what is the basis Mr. Mayor to think that you have the right to do that?"

But it is unclear whether anyone on the Council committee will try to go to bat for those represented by Pizzitola’s ad hoc organization. In his order putting off the deadline for signing up for this Medicare Advantage Plan, Judge Frank castigated the city for making inadequate preparations such as clarifying which providers will accept the new plan.

Once the city shows it has prepared for the changeover, however, it remains to be seen if, when and how the enrollment choice will be demanded again.

The promise of a robust benefit, made as a condition of long-term municipal employment, remains at the core of this sticky controversy over a massive cost-saving.

— Dan Janison @Danjanison

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