2015 New York Laws
LAB - Labor
Article 25-A - (Labor) NEW YORK STATE WORKER ADJUSTMENT AND RETRAINING NOTIFICATION ACT
860-A - Definitions.

  860-a.  Definitions.  As  used in this article, the following terms
  shall have the following meanings:
1. "Affected employees" means employees who may reasonably be expected
  to experience an employment loss as a consequence of  a  proposed  plant
  closing or mass layoff by their employer.
2. "Employment loss" means:
(a)  an  employment  termination,  other  than  a discharge for cause,
  voluntary departure, or retirement;
(b) a mass layoff exceeding six months;
(c) a reduction in hours of work of more  than  fifty  percent  during
  each month of any consecutive six-month period.
"Employment  loss"  shall not result under circumstances where a plant
  closing or mass layoff is the result of the relocation or  consolidation
  of  part  or  all  of the employer's business and, before the closing or
  mass layoff, the employer offers to transfer the employee to a different
  site of employment within a reasonable commuting distance with  no  more
  than a six-month break in employment, or the employer offers to transfer
  the  employee  to  any other site of employment, regardless of distance,
  with no more than a six-month break  in  employment,  and  the  employee
  accepts  within  thirty  days  of  the  offer  or of the closing or mass
  layoff, whichever is later.
3. "Employer" means any business enterprise that employs fifty or more
  employees, excluding part-time employees, or  fifty  or  more  employees
  that  work  in  the  aggregate  at  least  two  thousand hours per week.
  "Employer" shall not include the federal or state government or  any  of
  their  political subdivisions, including any unit of local government or
  any school district.
4. "Mass layoff" means a reduction in force which:
(a) is not the result of a plant closing; and
(b) results in an employment loss  at  a  single  site  of  employment
  during any thirty-day period for:
(i)   at  least  thirty-three  percent  of  the  employees  (excluding
  part-time employees); and
(ii) at least twenty-five employees (excluding  part-time  employees);
  or
(iii)  at  least  two  hundred  fifty  employees  (excluding part-time
  employees).
5. "Part-time employee" means an  employee  who  is  employed  for  an
  average of fewer than twenty hours per week or who has been employed for
  fewer  than  six of the twelve months preceding the date on which notice
  is required.
6. "Plant closing" means the permanent  or  temporary  shutdown  of  a
  single  site of employment, or one or more facilities or operating units
  within a single site of  employment,  if  the  shutdown  results  in  an
  employment  loss  at the single site of employment during any thirty-day
  period  for  twenty-five  or  more  employees  (other   than   part-time
  employees).
7.  "Representative"  means  an  exclusive  representative  within the
  meaning of section 9(a) or 8(f) of the National Labor Relations Act  (29
  U.S.C.  159(a), 158(f)) or section 2 of the Railway Labor Act (45 U.S.C.
  152).
8.  "Relocation"  means the removal of all or substantially all of the
  industrial or commercial  operations  of  an  employer  to  a  different
  location fifty miles or more away.