ALBANY — Travelers flying into New York airports from states with high rates of coronavirus infections will now be mandated to fill out forms disclosing their travel plans or face being immediately given a summons that carries a $2,000 fine, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced Monday.
The new mandate, which will be issued by the state Department of Health, comes after tens of thousands of airline travelers have been refusing to sign the forms and brushing past tables in airports that are staffed by health officials tasked with collecting the information.
"You must give officials at the airport your form as to where you came from and where you're going, before you leave the airport," Cuomo said. The new edict "will be enforced at every airport in the state of New York."
The states currently on New York's mandatory travel quarantine list are Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Utah.
The Port Authority will enforce the new regulation at downstate airports. Cuomo's office said that at upstate airports — MacArthur, Westchester, Albany, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo and Niagara Falls — enforcement teams stationed at the regional airports will be comprised of state Department of Health peace officers and State Police.
The governor's office said the law enforcement personnel will meet arriving aircraft at the gate and greet disembarking passengers to request proof that they have completed the traveler forms. But it's unclear whether the federal Transportation Safety Administration will waive regulations to allow the state workers, including troopers, past airport checkpoints and into so-called "sterile" areas, where police officers and other workers are credentialed to go after receiving special training and separate identification.
Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple, whose department has a $2.2 million annual contract with Albany International Airport to oversee security, said he learned about the new regulation as a result of Cuomo's briefing Monday.
"You need to take a class to be certified to go into sterile areas," Apple said. "It’s a separate ID; it doesn’t matter who you are. You need that separate ID in order to go back there. That’s through the TSA."
Doug Myers, a spokesman for Albany International Airport, said there is "approved security protocol in place" that will allow "non-badged individuals to proceed through the TSA checkpoint."
Myers said that the state workers will be provided with tables and chairs to greet disembarking passengers at the passenger gates.
State officials do not have the legal authority to obtain flight passenger manifests.
But Cuomo said the enforcement will be rigid.
Anyone who flouts the new requirement "can then be brought to a hearing and ordered to complete mandatory quarantine," Cuomo said. "We can't have a situation where we have people coming from other states bringing the virus again."
At the Elmira, Ogdensburg and Plattsburgh airports, the enforcement teams will be there only on the days when there flights arriving from impacted states, officials said.
The state Department of Health two weeks ago said government workers had collected more than 6,600 questionnaires from travelers who had landed at New York airports in the first week after Cuomo first imposed a 14-day quarantine, which went into effect on June 25.
The effort to monitor the travelers and mandate compliance was not seamless, with thousands of travelers declining to fill out the forms and at least one airline ,JetBlue, initially declining to distribute them to their passengers aboard inbound New York flights, according to state workers who have taken part in the work. JetBlue has since begun distributing the forms along with all other airlines, Cuomo said.
The state does not have authority to compel airlines — which are regulated by the Federal Aviation Administration — to distribute the forms.
New York had initially been paying overtime to investigators with the Health Department's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement to join other employees stationed at airport deplaning exits to gather the forms. People who did that work said most travelers would brush past the makeshift informational checkpoints without stopping. The BNE investigators have since been reassigned to other duties.
The two-page forms carry the header "New York State Traveler Health Form" and ask participants to list their personal information, including name, phone numbers, email and residential addresses as well as their ultimate destination. It asks travelers to list states they have visited and the dates, as well as to disclose any information about COVID-19 symptoms. The form ends with a warning above the signature line stating the person submitting the form is providing truthful information "under penalty of law."
"Upon entering New York, if you are a traveler and do not have a suitable dwelling for your 14-day quarantine period, you must find appropriate accommodations at your own cost," the form states. "If you are a NYS resident returning from travel and do not have appropriate accommodations for quarantine, please call your local health department."
Many other governors have imposed similar mandatory quarantines for people visiting or returning to their states, but New York's order imposes hefty civil penalties — up to $10,000 — for anyone who violates the requirement. Other states have made the orders "advisory."
In order for someone to face penalty in New York, Public Health Law had required that they first be notified by a local health department official that they are subject to quarantine and ordered to isolate themselves or their family. But under the mandate announced by Cuomo, someone can now receive a summons immediately for non-compliance.
There is no timetable for how long New York's quarantine requirement will remain in effect; Cuomo imposed it at a time when tens of thousands of people are beginning to embark on summer vacations, including to locations that include the Carolinas and Florida, which are on the list of states flagged as high-risk.
States are included in the advisory if 10 per 100,000 residents or 10 percent of the total population tests positive on a seven-day rolling average.
Someone who merely passes through a high-risk state, and may visit a few rest areas along the way or have a layover at an airport, are not required to self-quarantine upon entering New York.
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