S7808A Passed Both Houses.
What Tier 2A Would Actually Change for Your NYPD Pension

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What just happened

On June 1, 2026, the New York State Senate passed S7808A by a vote of 59 to 1. Three days later the Assembly passed the companion bill, A8322A. That is further than this idea has ever gotten. The 2023 version died in committee without a floor vote in either house.

The bill has not been delivered to the Governor yet, and nothing changes until she signs it. If history is a guide, that wait can be long. The FDNY got this exact same fix in 2021, and it took about four months between passage and the Governor's signature.

So the honest status is: closer than ever, still not law.

The two salary-base rules Tier 2 lives under today

Your NYPD service pension is built on your final average salary, and right now there are two different rules for calculating it inside the same tier.

If you were hired before July 1, 2000, the Police Pension Fund uses the greater of three numbers: your pensionable earnings in the final 12 months, the average of your final 36 months, or the average of your best three consecutive calendar years.

If you were hired on or after July 1, 2000, you get one number: the final 12 months. No look-back. If your last year on the job was not your peak earnings year, that is the number you carry anyway.

The sponsor's memo puts the problem plainly: overtime varies greatly year to year, and a 12-month-only basis often denies these members the ability to have their pension reflect their peak years.

What S7808A changes

The bill adds one subdivision to Section 443 of the Retirement and Social Security Law: post-2000 Tier 2 members would have their salary base determined in the same manner as pre-2000 members. That is the whole mechanism. The greater-of menu instead of the single 12-month window.

Because it is a greater-of test, the change can only match or raise your salary base. It cannot lower it. The members it helps most are the ones whose overtime peaked earlier in their career, or whose final year came in light.

Two things it does not do. It does not remove the anti-spiking limits: pensionable earnings in any measuring period are still capped at 120 percent of the prior period, under every basis. And it does not touch Tier 3. If you were hired on or after July 1, 2009, this bill is not about you.

Firefighters already know how this story goes. The FDNY received the identical fix in 2021, now Section 443(h). S7808A would simply extend the same treatment to the NYPD side.

How much is it actually worth?

Less than the headlines will suggest, on average. The city's Chief Actuary, in the fiscal note printed with the bill, assumed final average salary would increase by about a quarter of one percent across the affected group, based on an analysis of historical salary and overtime patterns.

That average hides a wide range. For a member whose final 12 months happened to be a career-normal year, the bill changes nothing. For a member whose peak overtime years came at 17 and 18 years of service instead of year 20, the best-three-consecutive-years option could matter in a way the average does not capture.

The right way to think about it: S7808A is a floor, not a raise. It protects your pension from an unlucky final year. It is not a windfall.

The one mistake to avoid right now

Here is the conversation we worry about: a Tier 2 member at 19 or 20 years, eligible to file, deciding to hold their papers because a bill on the Governor's desk might bump their number.

Look at what that bet actually is. The bill applies only to members who retire on or after its effective date, so retiring before enactment locks in current law. But a veto is possible, and New York governors have vetoed pension sweeteners before. The average uplift is modest by the actuary's own math. And every month you wait is a month of pension checks you did not collect, which for most members is a bigger number than the bill is worth.

Waiting on S7808A is a bet, not a plan. Your retirement date should work under current law. If the bill becomes law, treat whatever it adds as a bonus.

The way to get there is to know your number under both bases before you decide anything: what your pension pays on your final 12 months, and what it pays on your best three consecutive years. If those two numbers are close, the bill is noise for you. If they are far apart, you know exactly what is riding on the Governor's pen, and you can make the timing call with your eyes open.

What to do now

Run your pension both ways. Our free NYPD pension calculator now carries an S7808A bill-watch panel: run it once with your final-12-months earnings and once with your best three-year average, and compare. Two minutes, no email required.

Watch delivery, not headlines. The bill is news when it reaches the Governor's desk and again when she acts. We track it and update this page when the status changes.

And if the two numbers are far apart and a timing decision is on your table this year, that is worth an actual conversation, not a comment section.