Legal Aid Lawyer Enters St. Clare's Pension Fight

"A law service that helps low-income people is stepping in to investigate the pension collapse of the former St. Clare's Hospital.

So far, the Legal Aid Society of Northeastern New York has two former hospital workers as clients, said Victoria Esposito, advocacy coordinator for the Albany-based not-for-profit group. 

Esposito said she will be investigating the troubled pension fund that covers more than 1,100 workers at the former hospital, which closed in 2008 as part of a state-ordered consolidation. "Whatever relief we might obtain for our clients might also be helpful to other former employees," she said.

She said she is being assisted Gary Stone, a lawyer with Brooklyn Legal Aid who is part of the group's Mid-Atlantic Pension Counseling Project. Esposito is a former assistant district attorney in St. Lawrence County who joined Legal Aid in 2011.

Legal Aid offers legal help for people who meet income requirements, which are set at a household income of no more than 125 percent of the federal poverty level..."

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