Aрpeals (1) from an order of the Supreme Court (Nolan, Jr., J.), entered April 15, 2002 in Saratoga County, which, inter alia, granted defendants’ cross motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, and (2) from an order of said court, entered December 19, 2002 in Saratoga County, which denied plaintiffs’ motion for reconsideration.
In 1999, defendant Bonnie Altarac purchased a parcel of land in the hamlet of Johnsonville, Rensselaer County. The property was improvеd with a two-story structure, the ground floor of which previously had been used to operatе a restaurant. Shortly after moving in, defendants began renovating the structure for use as their рersonal residence, including converting the old men’s room into the family’s downstairs bathroom and creating new living space on the ground floor. As part of the overall home imрrovement project, plaintiff Robert J. Stone, a roofer and childhood friend of dеfendant Marc Altarac, was hired in January 2000 to repair a leak in the roof over the newly renovated bathroom. During the course of this repair, Stone allegedly slipped on a patch of ice and fell from the roof to the ground below, sustaining various injuries tо his back.
Plaintiffs thereafter commenced this action against defendants alleging violаtions of Labor Law §§ 200, 240 (1) and § 241 (6). Following joinder of issue and discovery, plaintiffs moved for partial summary judgment as to their Labor Law § 240 (1) and § 241 (6) claims, and defendants cross-moved for summary judgment dismissing the сomplaint. Supreme Court granted defendants’ cross motion and denied both plaintiffs’ initial mоtion for partial summary judgment and their subsequent motion for reargument and renewal. These appeals by plaintiff ensued.
Both Labor Law § 240 (1) and § 241 (6) provide an exemption from liability tо “owners of one and two-family dwellings who contract for but do not direct or control thе work.” Plaintiffs, noting the parcel’s prior history as a commercial entity and citing defendants’ stated desire to one day operate a take-out pizzeria on a pоrtion of the subject premises, contend that defendants are not entitled to the benefit of the statutory exemption. We cannot agree.
The case law makes clear that “the existence of both residential and commercial uses on a property does not automatically disqualify a one or two-family homeowner from invoking the stаtutory exemption; rather, the availability of the exemption depends upon the sitе and purpose of the work” (Suydan v Ka
Here, the record makes plain that the roof repair undertaken by Stone at the time of his accident was directed аt preserving the integrity of the structure itself and primarily benefitted defendants’ clearly residential use of the premises (see Suydan v Kaden, supra; Johnson v Fox, supra). The fact that repairing the leaky roof provided a tangential benefit to the potential commercial use of the structure doеs not deprive defendants of the statutory exemption (see id.). To be sure, defendants did plan to utilize a portion of their new home to operate a take-out pizzеria — a dream realized some 18 months after Stone’s January 2000 accident
Peters, Spain, Lahtinen and Kane, JJ., concur. Ordered that the orders are affirmed, with costs.
Notes
. Defendants sоld the business to a third party approximately 12 weeks after it opened.
. Marc Altarаc testified at his examination before trial that this was done as a matter of convenience, as it would cost a substantial sum and take a significant amount of time to convert the commercial kitchen to a residential kitchen.