Gov. Cuomo is abusing his power over the MTA to make life better for some commuters — for now. Over time, though, Cuomo’s move could hurt all outer-borough commuters just as badly as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s Port Authority flunkies hurt Fort Lee with their George Washington Bridge high-jinks.
Cuomo, a Democrat, wants Republican votes for re-election this fall. So he’s targeting GOP-leaning Staten Island — and, rather than using traffic cones, he’s using E-Z Pass.
A month ago, Gov. Cuomo popped up with Borough President James Oddo, a Republican, and a bipartisan crew of lawmakers to announce an odd surprise: Staten Islanders will pay less to cross the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. For island residents, the round trip will cost $5.50, down from $6.
“All Staten Islanders should appreciate that our governor, Andrew Cuomo, made this happen,” Oddo said. “Tolls have been too high for far too long,” agreed Republican Senate leader Dean Skelos.
Actually, New York’s government has been too craven for too long.
Cuomo doesn’t have the legal right to cut tolls. Sure, he appoints the chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Tom Prendergast, who runs tolled bridges and tunnels in New York City as well as the subways and buses.
But Prendergast is supposed to act independently. State law gives him a six-year term, meaning he can’t lose his job if Cuomo wants to get rid of him tomorrow. Prendergast’s fellow board members, who vote on big MTA decisions like toll hikes (and cuts), are similarly protected.
There is a reason for this: You’ve never seen a governor stand with other politicians to announce a toll hike. And that’s fine, because the governor doesn’t make the decision.
So how could Cuomo be so confident, a month ago, that the MTA’s board would approve his toll cut, as it did last week?
The answer is obvious: The MTA wanted to make Cuomo happy.
No, Cuomo probably didn’t exert Jersey-style pressure. But the MTA’s action is still egregious.
The toll cut (plus a companion rebate program for trucks) will cost the MTA $14 million a year in revenue. It’s eating half that — and has made itself more dependent on Albany lawmakers who’ve promised to give it the other half.
But the MTA doesn’t have $7 million to give away. It already has no idea where it’s going to get the billions it needs over the next five years to keep replacing and repairing tracks, trains and buses. Plus, it’s told its main labor union that it’s broke.
The MTA has badly hurt its own credibility with this move — no cones necessary.
Just listen to Dick Ravitch. The ’80s MTA chief was worried enough last week to show up to the MTA’s board meeting to urge members to vote against the giveaway.
“I feel strongly enough about this, remembering all the battles that I fought to eke out every penny of revenue for this authority,” he testified. By voting in the interests of the governor and not the MTA itself, he warned, board members could be breaking state law. “I’m just flabbergasted that nobody understands the seriousness,” he later told The New York Times.
Ravitch, in his ninth decade, is the most credible person alive on the topic. He’s responsible for improving life for New Yorkers who weren’t even born when he ran the MTA. In the early ’80s, he got state lawmakers to approve a slew of taxes so that the agency could reverse decades of neglect.
The hipsters and the babies sporting F-line onesies would all have gentrified somewhere else — not Brooklyn, maybe not anywhere in the city — if Ravitch hadn’t gotten us a semi-functioning transit system.
But now the MTA is apparently part of Cuomo’s re-election team.
Sure, board members can argue that pleasing the governor and state lawmakers is good for the authority in the long term. But that’s a dangerous game. Several of them, in voting for the toll deal, reminded their colleagues that their constituents, too, are suffering some terrible “inequity” burden because of where they live, on Long Island or in Rockland County or in Brooklyn, taking the bus.
It’s hard enough to get anyone to think about the MTA’s long-term burdens — like its investment needs and soaring pension and health-care costs — without the added burden of politicians now knowing that the agency will give out toll cuts now in return for some future reward.
Don’t blame the governor entirely, though. Everyone at the MTA should know better than to tell him, “yes”: The more you let the politicians get away with, the more they’ll expect.