The company that runs New York’s state-funded home care program has agreed to pay its workers $162 million to settle a wage theft lawsuit filed last year.
The deal, which must be approved by a federal judge, is one of the largest wage-related payouts in New York history, according to lawyers Hugh Baran of Katz Banks Kumin LLP and Michael Diller of the Legal Aid Society, who were part of the legal team that represented the plaintiffs. It could benefit as many as 200,000 home health aides with average payouts of nearly $700 each — equivalent to a week’s pay.
“We’re really proud of the results, and what it will mean for these home care workers who work so hard to take care of their loved ones,” Baran said.
Those aides are employed as part of the Consumer Directed Personal Assistance Program, or CDPAP, a New York state program that allows disabled people to receive state-funded home care, often from their own family members. Since last year, the program has been run by the private company Public Partnerships LLC, which was selected by Governor Kathy Hochul’s administration. The aides sued PPL for wage theft, and the company will now be responsible for the $162 million payment.
Since PPL took over the program in April 2025, workers have repeatedly accused it of failing to pay them on time, or in some cases, pay them at all. PPL did not admit any illegal behavior in the settlement.
“We categorically deny the allegations in this lawsuit, and the settlement reflects no admission of liability or wrongdoing. We look forward to putting this matter behind us,” said PPL spokesperson Meg Fitzgerald.
The two sides bargained for months to reach the deal.
The approval process for settlements in class action lawsuits like this one can take months, so workers may not receive payments until early 2027, according to Baran and Diller.
Even so, the settlement was welcome news to Debbie McGowan, who lives on Long Island and cares for her adult son, who has Down syndrome. Since last year, McGowan has spent hours wrestling with PPL’s system, trying to get her shifts properly counted so she could be paid in full.
Those struggles “took time away from caring for my child,” McGowan said. The settlement is “a really good decision, and it’s fair,” she added.
As part of the settlement, aides will receive at least $25 million in compensation for money that PPL deducted from their wages to pay for a mandatory health insurance plan. That plan was harshly criticized by many aides and policy wonks, who noted that it did not cover basic medical care like doctor and hospital visits. Most of the aides already had insurance from other sources.
Last year, New York Focus reported extensively on that plan, which PPL funded by collecting 40 cents per hour from workers’ paychecks. New York Focus estimated that PPL could make as much as $60 million in annual profits from the plan. Home health aides in New York make about $20 per hour.
The plan was run by health insurer Leading Edge Administrators, a company that was founded by a convicted fraudster and has a long record of saddling patients with medical debts, approving treatments and then refusing to pay, and canceling patients’ insurance without notice.
In the wake of New York Focus’s reporting, PPL announced that it would discontinue the plan and end its relationship with Leading Edge.
Still, aides in the New York City area were required to enroll in the plan until April 30, when it was discontinued and PPL ended its business relationship with Leading Edge, which also goes by the name Omni Advantage. If the settlement is approved, aides will be reimbursed for at least some of the money that they were forced to spend on that plan.