Sec. 72.1. Report of open estates administered by public administrators of the counties within the City of New York

(a) As used in this Part, the term public administrator shall mean the public administrator of any county in which the office of public administrator exists or any deputy public administrator or other individual who is performing the duties of the public administrator as provided for by law.

(b) Whenever the estate of a decedent is being administered by a public administrator pursuant to article 11 of the Surrogate's Court Procedure Act, and such estate has not been fully distributed nor a final accounting filed with petition for settlement with the appropriate Surrogate's Court, the public administrator shall annually in the month of January file a Report of Open Estates with the office of the State Comptroller, covering every open estate in respect to which permanent letters of administration were issued to such public administrator on or before the preceding December 31st. The Report of Open Estates shall be submitted on a form prescribed by the State Comptroller and shall include the name of the estate; the date letters were granted; the amount of the gross estate; the amount undistributed; reasons why final distribution of the estate has not been made; the anticipated estate closing date and such additional information as the State Comptroller may deem warranted. If there are no such open estates, a report must be filed by the public administrator indicating that no estates are open.

(c) The State Comptroller may consider failure to timely file any report provided for herein as grounds for petitioning the Surrogate of the county having jurisdiction, praying for a judicial settlement of the accounts of any such public administrator, pursuant to the provisions of section 8(11) of the State Finance Law.

(d) The periods set forth in subdivision (b) of this section are not intended to set a standard time for completion of estate administration, but rather to fix the times within which the State Comptroller is to be informed of the status of open estates.

(e) This section shall not limit the power of the Surrogate's Court to direct an accounting at any time on its own initiative or on petition pursuant to section 2205 of the Surrogate's Court Procedure Act.

(f) No open estate shall be excluded from the applicability of the provisions of this section by virtue of the fact that permanent letters of administration were issued to the public administrator prior to the effective date of this regulation.