NYS: legislative developments

http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?bn=A08398(memo); http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?bn=A08398&sh=t(text)

A bill has been introduced that includes a number of significant changes affecting the rights of parents of kids in special education. The following are highlights:

1. Section 8 would amend S 4404(1)(a) of the Education Law to create an exception to the two year statute of limitations for due process for tuition reimbursement claims for unilateral parental placements. The bill would require that a complaint seeking tuition reimbursement for the unilateral parental placement of a student in a private school be presented not more than one hundred and eighty days from the unilateral placement by the parent or person in parental relation in the private school. This section would take effect September 1, 2009.

2. elimination of the separate consent requirement for the initial provision of the summer component of a 12 month program

The following proposed changes affect privately placed kids and their parents:

1. the Education Law 3602-c deadline for written request for services would be changed to April 1 for parents of kids who have already had an IEP developed and implemented
2. mandatory mediation prior to hearing; where a due process complaint involveschild find requirements, the federal rules would apply and mediation would continue to be optional.
3. school district of location would now be able to provide a 12 month program(privately placed kids)
4. This bill would also add language to clarify, both for July and August services and services provided during the regular school year, that a student parentally placed in a nonpublic school has no entitlement under S 3602-c to the provision of a special class or integrated co-teaching services. Section 3602-c is intended to authorize the provision of special education programs and services to supplement the regular educa- tion instruction provided by the nonpublic school. Unlike related services, resource room services, consultant teacher services and supplementary aids and services, which are designed to supplement regu- lar education instruction, a special class or integrated co-teaching services necessarily involves a teacher providing a portion of the core regular educational program of the student. Such core instruction should be provided by the nonpublic school, and would be both costly and burdensome for the school district of location to provide.
5. S4402(4)(d) of the Education Law would be amended to provide thatwhere the board of education of a student’s school district of residence provides transportation up to a distance of fifty miles to and from a nonpublic school which a student identified with a disability attends for the purpose of receiving services or programs from the nonpublic school which are similar to special education programs and services recommended for the student by the district of residence, the student would not be entitled to special education programs and services from the school district of location pursuant to S 3602-c of the Education Law . As a condition of eligibility for such transportation, the parent or person in parental relation to the student would be required to consent to the provision of notice by the school district of residence to the chairperson of the committee on special education of the school district in which the nonpublic school is located. Such notice must be provided by the district of residence no later than thirty days after commencing transportation services.

Unless otherwise indicated in the statute, the changes would take effect on June 30, 2009. Some of the changes to 3602-c would take effect in 2010.