Fell on a Snow-Covered Sidewalk: Who Owns It Decides Your Deadline

Attorney Answer

Before anything else, find out who was responsible for that stretch of pavement, because in New York the answer changes both the defendant and your deadline — and the shortest deadline is ninety days. A fall on a snow-covered sidewalk can be a claim against a public corporation, against the owner of the building the sidewalk runs past, or against a contractor hired to clear it, and those routes do not share a clock.

In New York City the usual answer is the building. New York City Administrative Code § 7-210 shifted responsibility for maintaining a sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition, including the removal of snow and ice, from the City to the abutting property owner. Which properties it covers and which it excepts is a question of its own terms for a New York attorney. Outside the five boroughs the allocation is different again, and often turns on a local law, which is why the address matters more than anything else you can write down today.

If a public corporation is responsible — a city, county, town, village, school district or transit authority — two clocks run at once. General Municipal Law § 50-e(1)(a) requires that "the notice of claim shall comply with and be served in accordance with the provisions of this section within ninety days after the claim arises; except that in wrongful death actions, the ninety days shall run from the appointment of a representative of the decedent's estate." Alongside it, General Municipal Law § 50-i(1)(c) requires that "the action or special proceeding shall be commenced within one year and ninety days after the happening of the event upon which the claim is based; except that wrongful death actions shall be commenced within two years after the happening of the death." Serving the notice and then waiting the ordinary three years is how a good claim dies.

Missing ninety days is not automatically the end. General Municipal Law § 50-e(5) lets a court extend the time on application, and it directs the court to consider in particular whether the public corporation, its attorney or its insurer acquired actual knowledge of the essential facts constituting the claim within that period or a reasonable time after, along with other circumstances the subdivision lists — including infancy or incapacity, justifiable reliance on settlement representations, an excusable error about which public corporation to name, and whether the delay substantially prejudiced the defense. That is a discretionary application, not a right — a reason to see a lawyer quickly.

If the defendant is a private owner instead, CPLR 214 applies: three years for "an action to recover damages for a personal injury except as provided in sections 214-b, 214-c, 214-i and 215". And what you were doing matters but does not end the claim. CPLR 1411(a) provides: "Except as provided in subsection (b) of this section, in any action to recover damages for personal injury, injury to property, or wrongful death, the culpable conduct attributable to the claimant or to the decedent, including contributory negligence or assumption of risk, shall not bar recovery. The amount of damages otherwise recoverable shall be diminished in the proportion which the culpable conduct attributable to the claimant or decedent bears to the culpable conduct which caused the damages." How long the snow had been there, and whether it was still falling, are contested questions in these cases and are governed by court decisions rather than by statute.

What you can do

1. Fix the location precisely — the address the sidewalk runs in front of, and photographs of the exact spot with something in frame for scale.

2. Photograph the condition now if anything remains, and save weather records for that date and the days before it.

3. Find out who owns the abutting building, through the tax roll or the deed record.

4. Get medical treatment and make sure the record says how the fall happened; keep the shoes you were wearing, unwashed.

5. Take the address, the photographs and the medical records to a New York attorney immediately, because if a public corporation is responsible the ninety-day period may already be running.

⏱ Time limits apply. General Municipal Law § 50-e(1)(a) keys its ninety days to the claim arising, § 50-i(1)(c) keys one year and ninety days to the happening of the event, and CPLR 214(5) keys three years to the date of the injury when the defendant is private. Which of those governs depends on who was responsible for that sidewalk — a fact this page cannot know. Do not count from a calendar on your own; bring the date and the address to a New York attorney for review now rather than later.