The Assembly passed legislation addressing a wide range of consumer issues, including the following new laws:

Mail Order Prescriptions - Prohibits health insurers that provide coverage for prescription drugs from forcing enrollees to purchase covered prescriptions by mail order. Instead it allows them to use a network participating retail pharmacy at no additional charge to the enrollee. (A5502B is awaiting the Governor’s signature.)

Barring Paper Billing fees - Prohibits businesses from charging additional fees to consumers who want to receive paper-billing statements or pay by regular mail. The new law specifies that businesses would be able to offer consumers a credit or other incentive to select a specific payment option, such as a discount for making an online payment. This law took effect April 18, 2011.

Water Bill Exemptions - Allows charitable organizations to continue to provide services, by extending full or partial exemptions on water bills in New York City until September 1, 2012. Not-for-profits and other charitable groups are eligible for the exemption, including hospitals, day care centers, religious sites used exclusively for public worship and certain non-public schools.

Under federal law, you have the right to opt out of “pre-approved” or “prescreened” solicitations for credit or insurance. If you no longer wish to receive these offers, you may opt out by calling 1-888-5OPTOUT or visiting www.OptOutPrescreen.com. You may choose to opt out for five years or permanently, and may opt back in at any time. Your request must be processed within five days, but it may take up to sixty days before you stop receiving pre-approved offers. Assemblywoman Weinstein’s Office can help you process your request.

After a suspected attempt by the Iranian government to carry out a terror plot on U.S. soil, Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein joined Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, Michael Miller, President of the JCRC of NY, the UJA Federation of NY, and colleagues to announce landmark legislation they are sponsoring to bar companies that invest in Iran’s energy sector from doing business with New York State or local governments.

In support, Weinstein stated, “For our nation’s safety, as well as our allies throughout the world, including Israel, we cannot allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons. By divesting the State from any business with companies whose actions further Iran’s pursuit of nuclear arms, we are doing our part to make the world a safer place.”

Just last week the legislature returned to Albany for a special session, negotiating and passing a comprehensive job growth and tax reform plan.

The bipartisan agreement reached by the Legislature and the Governor is a huge victory for New Yorkers. It requires millionaires and billionaires to share in the fiscal sacrifice, provides much-needed tax relief to low- and middle-income families, closes the budget gap, so that we have the revenue to allow us to continue delivering crucial services in education and health care. and gives the state essential funding for infrastructure projects that will create jobs.

The new tax code includes a new high-income tax bracket for households earning more than $2 million per year that will raise nearly $6 billion in revenue over the next three years, and includes an annual middle-class tax relief worth $690 million in each of the next three years. Overall, some 4.4 million taxpayers - more than 99 percent of all filers - will benefit from a tax cut thanks to this agreement.

Other components include:

• Lowering MTA Mobility payroll tax rates for businesses with annual payrolls above $1.25 million and exempting entirely those businesses with payrolls lower than $1.25 million as well as non-public elementary and secondary schools.

• Restoring $7 million to enhance access to child care subsidies, by increasing income eligibility for families applying for childcare.

• $25 million youth tax credit to provide incentives for businesses to hire and train at-risk or disadvantaged young people.

• $12 million dollars in funding for Youth Employment Readiness Training Programs.

• $54 million for special job placement programming, including, the Summer Youth Employment Program, Higher Education Opportunity Programs (HEOP), and Displaced Homemaker Programs.

To help protect homeowners from unfair and illegal foreclosure practices and to protect neighborhoods, Assemblywoman Weinstein, as Chair of the Assembly Judiciary Committee has sponsored new laws to protect homeowners and held public hearings on Mortgage Foreclosures in New York to examine the impact of the foreclosure crisis on individuals and communities. At a hearing this November, testimony quantified the effect of foreclosed homes on neighborhood property values. Homes can often remain vacant for long periods of time during a foreclosure process, lowering housing prices in the surrounding areas. This has caused a ripple effect in some communities, causing other homes to be abandoned and making it more difficult for families seeking to sell their homes. According to a recent study presented at the hearing, “A single foreclosure can reduce prices of homes within 250 feet by 1-2% and 3 foreclosure filings within 500 feet of a home can depress its sale value by about 3%.”

New York is the twenty-ninth state to require health insurance coverage for conditions relating to autism spectrum disorder. Every day, thousands of New York families are faced with the challenge of caring for a child diagnosed with autism, and every day many of those same families worry that their child’s medical treatment may not be covered by their insurance.

That’s why I sponsored a new law that will require insurance companies to cover the costs relating to the screening, diagnosis and treatment of autism.

Under this new law, children who have autism may be diagnosed earlier, and thus be able to begin treatment at an earlier age, improving their quality of life. Receiving treatment at an earlier age will help insurance companies save money in the long run. (The law takes effect on November 1, 2012 and applies to insurance policies issued or renewed after that date).