Assemblyman Robert Smullen (R,C,I,SAM-Meco) joined his fellow Assembly Minority colleagues, the New York State Farm Bureau, and farm owners today to call for the maintenance of the farm employee overtime threshold. The threshold, recently lowered from 60 hours to 40 hours on the recommendation of Albany bureaucrats, is an undue burden on the farms of the state. Smullen believes that the 98% of farms which are family owned and operated should be supported by the state.

“Farmers in our state are hard-working citizens who provide good, quality products across the state and country,” Smullen said. “To continually undermine their bottom line by mandating they fit the farming lifestyle into a conventional 40-hour work week is unthinkable. It’s a misguided policy that makes it hard for farmers to compete in a regional economy.”