N.Y. Education Law § 909: School hygiene districts

§ 909. School hygiene districts. 1. The board of supervisors of any

county, with the approval of the commissioner of education, shall have

power to establish in such county a school hygiene district which shall

include the supervisory district or districts in such county, as defined

in this chapter. The board of education of any union free school

district of four thousand five hundred or more population, which employs

a superintendent of schools, or of any city having a population of less

than fifty thousand, within such county, may at any time adopt a

resolution requesting that such union free school district or city be

included within such school hygiene district, and after the approval of

such request by the district committee on school hygiene, herein-below

mentioned, and by the commissioner of education, and upon the subsequent

filing by the clerk of such board of education of a certified copy of

such resolution and of a certified copy of such approvals with the clerk

of the board of supervisors, such union free school district or city

shall be included within such school hygiene district.

2. When such a school hygiene district is established, as hereinabove

provided, the board of supervisors shall appropriate funds for the

salary and necessary expenses of a district director of school hygiene.

Funds may also be appropriated for assistants to the director of school

hygiene. Within thirty days after such appropriation is made the

chairman of the board of supervisors shall call a meeting, to be held at

a date as early as practicable, of the district superintendents and

school superintendents in such school hygiene district together with the

chairman of the board of supervisors, at which meeting such persons

shall organize themselves into a district committee on school hygiene

and shall elect a chairman thereof. In any school hygiene district which

includes part or all of a county health district, as defined in the

public health law, the district health officer of such county health

district shall be a member of such committee. The district director of

school hygiene and assistants shall be appointed by and work under the

direction of such district committee on school hygiene. They shall meet

the qualifications established by the commissioner of education and be

certificated as supervisors of teachers. Any person appointed as such

district director of school hygiene shall be a physician duly licensed

and registered to practice in this state and shall have practiced as a

physician, or been engaged in public health work, for at least two

years.

3. It shall be the duty of the district director of school hygiene to

advise, assist, and exercise general supervision over, medical

inspectors, dentists and school nurses in the public schools in such

school hygiene district; to keep informed as to their work and require

such reports from them as he may deem necessary; to see that suitable

recommendations based on the findings of the medical inspectors in their

examinations of pupils are brought to the attention of their teachers

and of those in parental relation to such pupils; to aid, and keep

informed as to the work of, oral hygienists, nutrition workers, and

other school employees engaged in health work in such schools; to

inspect, and report to the proper authorities on, the sanitary

conditions of school buildings, and in other ways to promote the

physical welfare and health education of pupils. Whenever the board of

supervisors, or, in a county constituting, in whole or in part, a county

health district, the district health officer thereof, shall, under any

provisions of law now in force or hereafter enacted, assign any public

health nurse to the duties of a school nurse in any school or schools

within a school hygiene district, she may be assigned to perform such

duties under the direct control of the district director of school

hygiene of such school hygiene district. Such district director of

school hygiene shall be subject to supervision by the state medical

inspector of schools.

4. If it be ascertained upon any test or examination held by a medical

inspector under the provisions of section nine hundred four of this

article in any of the school districts within a school hygiene district

that any of the pupils are afflicted with defective sight or hearing or

other physical disability and the parents have been duly notified as to

the existence of such defects and physical disability and are unable to

provide the necessary relief and treatment for such pupils and such fact

is reported by said medical inspector to the district director of school

hygiene, such district director shall have power and it shall be his

duty to provide relief for such pupils within the amount appropriated

for such purpose by the board of supervisors.

5. The board of supervisors, after determining the amount of the

appropriation necessary for the salary and expenses of such district

director of school hygiene and assistants, shall levy one-half of such

amount by tax on the towns, union free school districts and cities, if

any, included within such school hygiene district, and shall apportion

such amount, so levied, among such towns, union free school districts

and cities, according to the assessed valuation of the taxable property

therein. Whenever a board of supervisors shall make such an

appropriation and levy such a tax, the commissioner of education shall

apportion to each such town, union free school district and city, an

amount equal to that so levied upon each such respective town, union

free school district or city. The board of supervisors shall likewise,

after determining the amount of the appropriation necessary for expenses

incurred for the relief of pupils under subdivision four of this

section, levy the total amount by tax upon the towns, union free school

districts and cities, if any, included within such school hygiene

district, and shall apportion such amount so levied among such towns,

union free school districts and cities according to the assessed

valuation of the taxable property therein. The sums collected from the

taxes so levied, and the amount apportioned by the commissioner of

education, shall be paid to the county treasurer of such county, who

shall expend such moneys for the purposes hereinabove provided and in

the same manner as other county charges are paid.