Friday, September 20, 2024

2:30pm – 3:00pm
REGISTRATION / LOG ON 

3:00pm - 3:50pm
E-FILING IN WORKERS' COMPENSATION CASES
Beth Lifshin-Clark, Deputy Clerk, Clerk's Office, Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department
(1 CLE Credit - Law Practice Management)
A NYSCEF representative will provide a CLE on e-filing in Workers' Compensation cases.
Beth Lifshin-Clark, Esq. was appointed Deputy Clerk of the Court by Presiding Justice Karen K. Peters on September 6, 2017.  She assists the Clerk of the Court in all aspects of Court administration, and oversees day-to-day operations of the Court's Law Research Department, serving as Chief Appellate Court Attorney since February 2015.  Prior to becoming Chief Appellate Court Attorney, served as Appellate Court Attorney (1997-1999), Law Clerk to Associate Justice E. Michael Kavanagh (1999-2012) and Law Clerk to Associate Justice Leslie Stein (2012-2015).  Ms. Lifshin-Clark graduated from Siena College (1994) and cum laude from Albany Law School (1997); Member, Albany Law Review.

3:50pm - 4:00pm
BREAK

4:00pm - 4:50pm
SECTION 32 WAIVER AGREEMENTS - THE NEW YORK STATE WORKERS' COMPENSATION BOARD
Clarissa Rodriguez, Esq., Chair & Commissioner, New York State Workers' Compensation Board
Steven Scotti, Esq., Executive Director, New York State Workers' Compensation Board
Keith Longden, Esq., Deputy General Counsel, New York State Workers' Compensation Board
(1 CLE Credit - Law Practice Management)
Section 32 allows the parties to fully and finally settle a claim for workers’ compensation benefits, or to settle only a discrete issue in a claim. However, a Section 32 Agreement must be approved by the Workers’ Compensation Board to be binding and enforceable. This session will include an overview of the use of Section 32 agreements and review the process for obtaining Board approval of a Section 32 Agreement, focusing on the numerous legal issues that arise when negotiating a settlement, and problematic language sometimes included in agreements that is scrutinized by the Board.

Clarissa M. Rodriguez, Esq. is the Chair & Commissioner of the New York State Workers' Compensation Board, which administers workers' compensation, disability benefits, and Paid Family Leave insurance. During her time at the Board, Mrs. Rodriguez has led the agency through several important legislative reforms and implementations, including the launch of New York’s landmark Paid Family Leave law, while also working to make significant improvements to the workers' compensation system. In 2023 NYS Governor Kathy Hochul reappointed Mrs. Rodriguez as Chair through 2029.

Before joining the Board in 2016, Mrs. Rodriguez worked as a litigator with the Legal Aid Society of NY and the Civil and Matrimonial Parts of the Nassau County Supreme Court. She also served with the Civil Rights Bureau of the NYS Office of the Attorney General, the City University of New York's (CUNY) Office of General Counsel, the Municipal Employees Legal Services (MELS) at District Council 37, and the Urban Justice Center, among others, prior to joining the Bar in 2007.

Mrs. Rodriguez has received numerous professional recognitions from the New York State Legislature, the Nassau County Executive, the New York State Bar Association, and other affinity Bars. Most recently she was awarded the AGA's 2024 Eleanor Clark Diversity Leadership Award in Washington D.C. She is part of the Governor’s Interagency Statewide Workforce Group, and Latina Mentorship Initiative. She chairs the NYS Self-Insureds Association Advisory Committee and is a member of the Dominican Bar Association and the Hudson Valley Hispanic Bar Association. She is a Council on Legal Education Opportunity (CLEO) Fellow and is a graduate of CUNY School of Law. She holds a BA in Political Science and Women's Studies from SUNY Purchase College and lives in Orange County, NY with her husband and two daughters.

Steven Scotti, Esq. has served as Executive Director of the New York State Workers' Compensation Board since September 2022. He was a practicing workers' compensation attorney for over 30 years, working exclusively in-house for New York self-insured employers, and dedicated to ensuring that injured co-workers promptly received all benefits to which they were legally entitled.

Steven began his legal career in the public sector at the U.S. Department of Labor, followed by over 15 years of service with the New York City Law Department, where he served as Chief of the Workers' Compensation Division for the last seven years. He joined Con Edison in 2002, where he managed the workers' compensation practice in its Law Department for over 16 years. Starting in 2013, Steven served for five years as Associate General Counsel for Labor, Employment, and Benefits, overseeing all labor and employment matters for the company. In 2019, he joined the Workers' Compensation Division of the New York City Transit Authority, serving as Deputy Executive Assistant General Counsel until leaving to join the Board.

Steven earned a BA in Political Science cum laude from Stony Brook University, and a JD with honors from New York Law School. He served on two Governor's workers' compensation task forces (Governor Spitzer's 2007 Rocket Docket Committee and Governor Paterson's 2010 Task Force on Group Self-Insurance). He is Co-Editor in Chief of the 2011 NYS Bar Association's Workers' Compensation Law and Practice in New York, and a frequent speaker on workers' compensation issues. In 2016, he was inducted as a Fellow in The College of Workers' Compensation Lawyers.

Steven brings his years of study of the New York Workers' Compensation Law and expertise managing claims and legal operations at three of the state's largest self-insured employer programs to his current position. He strives to guide and improve the system for all stakeholders in furtherance of the Board's critical mission to serve injured workers and employers.

Keith Longden, Esq. is the Deputy General Counsel for the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board. He has been in the Board’s Office of General Counsel (OGC) since 1998.

Prior to working at the Board, Keith began his legal career at the New York State Insurance Fund. He received his BA from the State University of New York College at Oneonta and his JD from Albany Law School.

5:00pm
WCA Reception

Saturday, September 21, 2024

8:00am - 9:00am
BREAKFAST AND REGISTRATION / LOG ON

9:00am - 9:50am
ANDERSON v. CITY OF YONKERS: A SWEEPING CHANGE IN THE LAW OF MENTAL STRESS ACCIDENTS
Geoffrey Schotter, Esq., Schotter Millican
(1 CLE Credit - Areas of Professional Practice)
In Matter of Anderson v. City of Yonkers, No. 535958, 2024 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 1763 (App. Div., 3d Dept. Mar. 28, 2024), the Third Department held that there is no higher burden on a claimant to establish an accident arising out of and in the course of employment in a pure mental stress case than there is in a physical accident case and that when determining whether a compensable accident exists in a pure mental stress case, the Board must consider the claimant's particular vulnerability and not just the average vulnerability of similarly situated coworkers. On the basis of this analysis, the Court held that claims by public facing workers for mental stress arising from the experience of working in COVID-19 prevalent workplaces are compensable even where the claimant never contracted COVID-19 itself, overturning the Board's policy to the contrary. This presentation would go into the history of workers' compensation accident jurisprudence, the role of that jurisprudence in the Board's fashioning of its COVID-19 prevalence doctrine, the history of mental stress case law after Wolfe v. Sibley, Lindsay & Curr Co., 36 N.Y.2d 505 (1975), the Court of Appeals decision finding for the first time that pure mental stress cases are compensable, and the changed landscape of the law regarding COVID-19 claims, mental stress claims, and even the meaning of an accident itself in the wake of the Anderson decision, and how this will affect our practices going forward.

Geoffrey Schotter, Esq. was born and raised in New York City. He graduated from Cornell University with a BA in 2005. Prior to law school, He attended a joint JD/MA program in law and legal history at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, graduating in 2011. While at Case Western, He was an editor of the Case Western Reserve Law Review and also helped found the Case Western Reserve Journal of Law, Technology and the Internet (JOLTI).  After graduating from Case Western, Geoffrey returned home to New York City and began a fellowship at the national office of the ACLU researching the growing crisis of America's aging prisoner population, and worked briefly in the Manhattan office of Meyer, Suozzi, English & Klein P.C. in their labor and employment practice.  In late 2012, at age 30, Geoffrey opened his solo workers’ compensation law practice, which grew steadily over the next 8 years. In 2020, he formed Schotter Millican with other attorneys with whom he had been working. Schotter Millican now represents more than 2,000 clients through the state of New York in workers’ compensation claims.

9:50am - 10:00am
BREAK

10:00am-10:50am
BUSINESS MEETING (Members Only)

10:50am-11:00am
BREAK

11:00am - 11:50am
REPRESENTING INJURED WORKERS UNDER 25
Mary Ellen O'Connor, O'Connor Law PLLC
(1 CLE Credit - Skills)
Younger Workers make up a significant number of the workforce, and like all workers, they sustain work-related injuries. This session will discuss the workers’ compensation law provisions for workers who are under the age of 25, the implications for younger workers who sustain work injuries, and the special concerns a Workers’ Compensation Attorney needs to consider with respect to these claims.

Mary Ellen O'Connor, Esq. is the founder of O’Connor Law PLLC.  After earning her BS from SUNY Albany and her MS from the College of Mount St. Vincent, Mary Ellen became a K-2 teacher. She soon discovered that many of her young students with learning disabilities were unable to access the services they needed to succeed in the classroom. Their parents either didn’t know about the resources available or struggled to navigate the legal red tape that was required.  Mary Ellen initially hoped that earning her law degree from CUNY School of Law would allow her to be a more effective advocate for children with special needs. Life took an unexpected turn, however.  Although Mary Ellen entered law school with the goal of focusing on special education law, she soon became frustrated with the ineffectiveness of the system and how it was being manipulated by the wealthy to provide extra advantages for their children. After an extended period of soul-searching, she channeled her desire to help others into a focus on workers’ compensation benefits law and Social Security disability law.

11:50am
CLOSING

Attendee Information 

• This event is being planned as a hybrid event, both in-person in Saratoga and virtually on Zoom.
• Registration is the same whether you attend in-person or virtually.
• Agenda subject to change.
• The content of this program is appropriate for experienced attorneys, as well as newly admitted attorneys.
• This continuing legal education program has been approved in accordance with the requirements of the Continuing Legal Education Board.
• Financial aid is available for this program.  Please click here for more information.
• A pre-event email will be sent the week prior to the event and will include all log in and event information. 
• If you have registered to attend, but find yourself unable to attend, you must cancel your registration by no later than noon on Friday, September 13th, or IWBA will be charged and, therefore, must then pass the cost along to you. If you cannot attend, please contact the office to have a substitute individual on your behalf.

Registration Information

Conference Registration Deadline: Friday, September 13, 2024 by noon

Member Registration Fee: $325
One Day Member Registration: $225

Non-Member Registration Fee: $525
One Day Non-Member Registration Fee: $425

All registrants are encouraged to register for the Friday Evening WCA Reception with a donation of $100.
Your donations protect the Injured Workers of New York and those that represent them. 

WCA RECEPTION REGISTRATION 

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