Weisenberg Working to Give 'Brady Bill' Second Life

“You have to fight for everything in Albany,” says New York State Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg, who, despite a veto by Gov. Andrew Cuomo earlier this week, hasn’t stopped battling for fallen Malverne firefighter Paul Brady’s name to appear on a state memorial.

Weisenberg met with the governor and his council Monday, the same day ” legislation sponsored by Weisenberg and Sen. Dean Skelos that would have amended the volunteer firefighters' benefit law to include the names of all members who die or have died while performing services in the line of duty on New York’s fallen firefighters wall at the Capitol Mall.

“I’m very saddened that the governor vetoed the bill,” he says. “New York’s memorial is a source of healing but this has turned a hallowed place into one of dividedness.”

The bill was drafted after a selection committee denied requests to add Brady’s name to the memorial after he perished in 2006 in an accident while performing maintenance on a heavy rescue fire truck.

“Paul Brady’s death has been deemed to be ‘in the line of duty’ by the president of the United States, the U.S. Department of Justice, the New York State Workers Compensation Board, the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation, the County of Nassau and the Supreme Court of the State of New York,” Weisenberg told Patch.  “He went to do his job...to go to the fire house and make sure equipment used in  a drill would be safe and he was killed.”

The assemblyman also pointed out that Brady’s name has been inscribed on both the national fallen firefighters memorial and Nassau County’s too, and yet a committee - comprised of three volunteer firefighters, five paid firefighters and two who fall into both categories - has kept him off New York State’s tribute.

“It’s tainted,” Weisenberg said of the committee, which is made up of a majority of paid firefighters even though he says 75 percent of New York is protected by volunteers.

Weisenberg explained that the committee’s criteria for placing deceased firefighters on the wall has changed since Brady’s death, but that the Malverne firefighter satisfied the requirements under both the new and old criteria to earn a place on the wall. Meanwhile, he says, every paid firefighter who has died in the line of duty, even one who was still a trainee at the time of his death, appear on the wall.

“This is prejudice and discrimination against volunteers, “ he added.

Weisenberg, along with Brady’s family, fellow firefighters and other supporters, had hoped legislation would override the committee’s decision, but it was killed by Gov. Cuomo, whose advisors found issue with the language.

However, Weisenberg is determined to resurrect it. He’s been working with Cuomo’s people to address the concerns in the bill, mainly that it appeared to create separate criteria for paid and volunteer firefighters, and to amend the bill to include all firefighters who have perished in the line of duty on the wall.

He couldn’t get Cuomo to guarantee he would sign the bill if the changes were made, but the governor did agree that “when given all the evidence of what took place and the existence of the committee…that people who die in the line of duty, whether paid or volunteer, belong on the memorial.”

It also wasn’t clear if the amended bill would need to go through the Senate and Assembly yet again, but if it did, Weisenberg wasn’t worried about getting the support from his fellow legislators. “We’re going to work together and get this done,” he says. “I don’t take ‘No’ for an answer.”