ALBANY, N.Y. (Feb. 7, 2006) – The Retail Council of New York State applauded legal challenges filed by the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) earlier today seeking to overturn health spending mandates enacted in Suffolk County, N.Y., and in Maryland.

The mandates were intended to target specific companies and require them to pay a special health care payroll assessment.

The Retail Council said that state and local laws regulating employee health benefit plans are invalidated by federal law, specifically the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).

“In light of this, the New York state Legislature and any locality should refrain from pursuing similar legislation which seeks to establish illegal, discriminatory, and extremely costly health care standards on employers,” said Retail Council President and Chief Executive Officer James R. Sherin.

“These measures do nothing to address the real health care problems in New York,” he said. “Our membership, like RILA’s, understands that while these health spending laws are written to target certain companies, they affect the entire retail industry – robbing each company of the flexibility it needs to meet the unique needs of its workforce.”

“Our members also know that legislation targeting one company today certainly can be focused later on other employers,” Mr. Sherin said. “This is a very serious issue.”

RILA’s lawsuits were filed in federal courts in Baltimore and Brooklyn.

“Over the past three decades, the Supreme Court of the United States has held repeatedly that ERISA, not state and local laws, regulates employer health plans,” said Steve Cannon of the law firm Constantine Cannon, outside General Counsel to RILA. “Now that the legislative process has played out in Maryland and Suffolk County, it is time to challenge these newly-enacted health plan mandates in the courts.”

RILA also asserts that the statutes violate the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution because they were written to single out specific companies for arbitrary treatment.

“Our members are committed to this litigation,” said RILA President Sandy Kennedy. “The spending mandates that we are challenging are unlawful and unwise, and divert focus and resources away from real solutions,” Kennedy added.

Copies of RILA’s lawsuits, as well as information about the litigation, can be found at www.retail-leaders.org.