By Benyamin Davidsons
On Monday May 25th, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the families of New York’s public workers who died fighting coronavirus will receive death benefits from the state and local governments. “I feel a grave responsibility to our frontline workers, our essential workers who understood the dangers of this COVID virus, but went to work anyway, because we needed them to,” said Cuomo at a press briefing at Manhattan’s Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum. “Today, we’re saying we honor that service, and we’re going to make sure that every government in the state of New York provides death benefits to those public heroes who died from COVID-19 during this emergency.”
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s office, had joined the effort to grant the essential workers with the benefits last week. His office was quick to take credit for the initiative on social media. “Thank you @NYGovCuomo for endorsing our plan to provide line of duty benefits to city workers lost to COVID-19,” tweeted City Hall press secretary Freddi Goldstein, just minutes after Cuomo’s announcement. “Everyday, but particularly on Memorial Day, it’s so important to stop and remember those we’ve lost, and do all we can to support the families they left behind.”
As reported by the NY Post, since early April, Gov. Cuomo has been working on the lifeline to support the families of police, firefighters, health care and transit workers employed by the government who gave their lives during this pandemic. “The people who showed up,” as Cuomo called them, but were lost will have state and local pension funds paid out to their families, similar to the benefits received by the kin of 9/11 heroes.
The details of the initiative, such as the estimated cost and disbursement timeline, have not yet been announced. Cuomo also said he is calling on the federal government to take it up a notch by approving hazard pay for responders. “It’s a way of saying thank you, we understand what you did, we appreciate what you did,” said Gov. Cuomo. “And it’s a way of showing Americans that when there is a next time — and there is a next time — that we truly appreciate those people who show up and do their duty.”
The day’s briefing also included a solemn Memorial Day service by the governor, complete with a moment of silence for the country’s fallen military heroes. The governor noted that we also mourn the 96 New Yorkers who perished due to the coronavirus in the last 24-hour period. “Ninety-six is still painfully high,” said Cuomo, of the new fatalities which bring NYS’s overall confirmed deaths to 23,488. “But only in the relative absurdity of our situation is that relatively good news. We remember those 96 families today.”
