The Second Department, over a dissent, reversing Supreme Court, determined that a notice of claim which named the correct party (New York City Housing Authority [NYCHA]) and address but mistakenly indicated the “Comptroller” of the NYCHA on the mailed envelope, was properly served. The envelope was misdirected to the Comptroller of the City of New York, despite the fact that the comptroller is at an entirely different address than that on the envelope:
As pertinent to this appeal, General Municipal Law § 50-e(3)(a) provides that the notice of claim should be mailed “to the person designated by law as one to whom a summons in an action . . . may be delivered.” Although the statute requires that the notice be mailed to the designated “person,” this generally refers to the public authority or government entity itself rather than a particular person employed thereby … . Here, there is no real dispute that simply writing “NYCHA” on the envelope would have satisfied the requirements of the statute.
Further, while NYCHA contends that there is no such person or entity as the “Comptroller of the NYCHA,” a “comptroller” is simply an officer of a municipal corporation, like NYCHA, “who is charged with duties [usually] relating to fiscal affairs, including auditing and examining accounts and reporting the financial status periodically” (Black’s Law Dictionary 347 [10th ed 2014]). In any event, the minor misnomer on the envelope need not be fatal to the action, especially where, as here, the plaintiff’s attorney properly mailed the same notice of claim form to both the Comptroller and NYCHA in order to assert a claim against both the City of New York and NYCHA, and the notice of claim itself named NYCHA.
Under these circumstances, we find that the envelope was properly addressed within the meaning of General Municipal Law § 50-e(3)(b) and the plaintiff properly served the notice of claim upon NYCHA within the requisite 90-day statutory period … . Carroll v City of New York. 2017 NY Slip Op 03148, 2nd Dept 4-26-2017
MUNICIPAL LAW (NOTICE OF CLAIM WHICH WAS MISDIRECTED BECAUSE OF A MINOR MISNOMER ON THE MAILED ENVELOPE DEEMED TIMELY SERVED)/NEGLIGENCE (MUNICIPAL LAW, NOTICE OF CLAIM WHICH WAS MISDIRECTED BECAUSE OF A MINOR MISNOMER ON THE MAILED ENVELOPE DEEMED TIMELY SERVED)/NOTICE OF CLAIM (MUNICIPAL LAW, NOTICE OF CLAIM WHICH WAS MISDIRECTED BECAUSE OF A MINOR MISNOMER ON THE MAILED ENVELOPE DEEMED TIMELY SERVED)