Advocates seek contempt ruling against Suffolk DSS over ADA violations

Advocates on April 9, 2026 asked the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York to hold the Suffolk County Department of Social Services in contempt for allegedly violating a 2022 class-action settlement in Newkirk et al. v. Imhof, Case No. 19-cv-04283. The motion, filed by the National Center for Law & Economic Justice, Empire Justice Center and Dentons US LLP, seeks court-ordered compliance, sanctions, monitoring and relief for class members who apply for or receive Medicaid, SNAP, Temporary Assistance and Temporary Housing Assistance.

The plaintiffs’ memorandum alleges systemic failures by SCDSS, saying the agency continued to deny reasonable accommodations required under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The filing cites concrete examples: a class member granted a private single-room accommodation was placed in a communal setting and chose to sleep in their car rather than accept the placement, and another class member granted an accessible shower with grab bars was housed in a unit with a standard shower and was unable to bathe for six weeks. Plaintiffs contend these are representative of broader patterns, and they assert compliance worsened beginning January 2025.

The 2022 Stipulation and Order, preliminarily approved in September 2022 and entered in October 2022, required SCDSS to implement processes to ensure meaningful access for people with disabilities. According to the contempt memorandum, the parties asked the court twice to extend its jurisdiction and amend the order to give the county more time and directed oversight, but plaintiffs now say those measures have been insufficient and seek a civil-contempt finding under the clear-and-convincing evidence standard the Stipulation sets forth.

Named plaintiffs in the case include Lance Newkirk, Dorothy W., Christopher G., and Tara V. The action, originally captioned against former Commissioner Frances Pierre, reflects leadership changes at SCDSS: Frances Pierre stepped down in 2024 and County Executive Ed Romaine appointed John E. Imhof as Commissioner in April 2024, prompting the updated case caption, Newkirk et al. v. Imhof.

The motion frames the stakes in numerical terms: New York State reports Suffolk County Medicaid enrollment at about 358,898 residents as of February 2026, SNAP caseloads at roughly 130,456 recipients in January 2025, and county materials estimate approximately 283,000 people with disabilities in Suffolk County. Plaintiffs ask the court to compel remedies that could include independent monitoring, reporting obligations, remedial training and, if warranted, monetary sanctions to secure access for those populations.

As of the April 9 filing, plaintiffs’ counsel Patrick Fowler of NCLEJ and Alex Dery Snider of Empire Justice Center had announced the motion publicly; the County Executive’s office and SCDSS had not issued a contemporaneous public statement responding to the contempt filing. The EDNY divisional courthouse in Central Islip will handle scheduling and any hearing requests; the plaintiffs asked the court both to enforce the 2022 Stipulation and to modify it if necessary to secure compliance.

If the court grants the relief plaintiffs seek, Suffolk County could face court-supervised reforms that change how the department processes accommodation requests and arranges housing for vulnerable residents, affecting hundreds of thousands of Medicaid and SNAP recipients across the county.