Watching Gov. Pataki at Ground Zero yesterday, there was a sense that someone in government was starting to address the needs of the forgotten victims of 9/11 - however incompletely, however late.

The governor's program holds the promise of helping thousands of World Trade Center responders by providing them medical coverage through the workers' compensation system and by boosting the availability of line-of-duty disability pensions and death benefits.

Case by heartbreaking case, the impacts are likely to be profound for men and women who served in the aftermath of 9/11 to the severe detriment of their health, as well as for the families of those who lost their lives due to illnesses that were brought on by exposures to the toxins released by the collapse of the twin towers.

Vito Valenti - terminally ill, lacking health insurance and praying for a lung transplant - should be among the many who can secure medical coverage after they were shut out by workers' comp on technicalities.

Rose Johnson, whose husband, Firefighter Stephen Johnson, died of lung disease two years after retiring, should be among the widows who can win line-of-duty death benefits for the rest of their lives.

Tylerann Zadroga, whose father, Detective James Zadroga, fell to lung disease when she was 4, should be among the children who are guaranteed support until they reach majority age.

And yet, there is so very much more to do about the devastating health consequences that are still emerging among Ground Zero workers.

In the first editorial in this series three weeks ago, we wrote, "No one in power - not Gov. Pataki, not Mayor Bloomberg, not the state and city health commissioners, not the U.S. government - has acknowledged the epidemic's scope, much less confronted it for the public health disaster that it is."

Our words are only slightly less true today. The forgotten victims of 9/11 still wait for a leader who will tackle the sweep of the health crisis that has beset them - someone who will assess its scope, devise properly funded treatment programs, establish monitoring to watch for trends in diseases and treatments, honor the fallen and persuade the federal government to meet its obligations to the ill.

We called on Bloomberg to be that leader, also urging him to review the inequities in disability, pension and workers' comp benefits afforded to Ground Zero responders. The mayor has yet to present a plan, and Pataki stole a march on him yesterday on the benefits front. Bloomberg was left to sound crabbed and cold-hearted in finding fault with the fiscal implications of the governor's actions.

Pataki saw correctly that those implications pale in comparison with the toll inflicted on the selfless heroes of 9/11, especially those who may pay with their lives for having served. Still, some accountability is in order, starting with workers' comp. Thousands of responders - civilians and city workers other than cops and firefighters - turned to this state-controlled program for medical coverage and lost wages of up to $400 a week only to be trapped in a dead-end bureaucratic nightmare that has lasted for almost five years.

In extending the time for responders to apply for benefits and pressing the system to be less hostile, Pataki is righting injustices that were allowed to proliferate under his watch for years. At the Mount Sinai Medical Center World Trade Center Monitoring Program, doctors expect to be able to move swiftly to help patients - as they should have been able to do all along.

Pataki made it easier for survivors of 9/11 responders to win line-of-duty death benefits by signing a bill that was pushed by municipal labor unions and sent to his desk by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Majority Leader Joe Bruno. The gist is that responders who die from specified illnesses, including lung disease and cancer, will be presumed to have contracted their illnesses at Ground Zero.

This is the provision to which Bloomberg objects because it exposes the city to liability in cases where there is no provable connection between 9/11 and a fatal illness. There is merit to the argument, and we, in fact, have looked dimly on similar so-called presumption bills in the past. But this is different. This is a time to be more generous.

The federal and city governments told the 40,000 people who gave their all at Ground Zero that the air was safe to breathe. It wasn't. And, now, more than 12,000 are sick and medical experts predict that even more serious illnesses are soon to show up. At least five responders have died already - and their families have had to fight like hell trying to prove their deaths stemmed form 9/11.

It is unacceptable to say that each family should prove the merits of its case while rejecting all the cases virtually out of hand. And, in this age of terror, it is wrong, counterproductive and unfair to ask first responders to rise to acts of heroism unless they are sure their families will be taken care of in the event that the worst happens.

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