The MTA and state lawmakers are finalizing a bill to save free student MetroCards for the next school year – a deal that could sink the transit agency further into debt.
Under the agreement, the state will contribute $25 million to the program, the city will give $45 million and the MTA will foot the remaining $144 million, as first reported by The Post.
Lawmakers are working to insert the agreement into a budget bill, expected to be introduced late tonight. The measure, which is not considered controversial, will likely be voted on tomorrow.
The agency is expected to make up the money used for the fares by further fattening its $400 million budget shortfall for 2010 and 2011, sources said.
That could mean more dire cost-saving measures.
Transit brass originally proposed cutting the student passes in December as a way to save money.
The state contribution to the free-card program would actually decrease from the current $45 million.
In the wheeling and dealing, a cap on MTA borrowing would be lifted so the agency can get on with the first two years of its next big-ticket capital program, along with provisions that would allow enforcement cameras in rapid-bus lanes.
Still, it’s not the conclusion the MTA planned for.
MTA chief Jay Walder has repeatedly said it’s the job of the city and state to fund the free cards, which have grown in cost over the past decade while government contributions have remained the same or been reduced.
He has said the price tag on the program – the cost if students paid the full fare – is about $214 million.
But some Albany lawmakers called that number “completely made up,” and many were incensed that the MTA would throw students into a political battle.
“There was something fundamentally wrong with using kids as a bargaining chip,” said Assemblyman Richard Brodsky (D-Westchester), who runs the Standing Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions, which oversees the MTA.
Sen. Martin Malave Dilan (D-Brooklyn), the transportation committee chair, said there was no way for the MTA to estimate the cost of the program.
“The trains have to run. The buses have to run” with or without the students, he said.
“They’re accepting it for this year with the hope that in the out years there will be more money.”
City officials called on the state to meet the amount they’re contributing.
“We kept up our end of the deal,” a source said, referring to the previous agreement where the state, the MTA and the city all forked out $45 million for the program.
Transit advocates said the state is being too stingy and that the student passes are being too heavily subsidized by the riding public.
“It’s a deal that was deemed adequate in 1995,” said Gene Russianoff, of the Straphangers Campaign. “I think the Legislature is wrong for cutting funding for schoolkids and I think the MTA is right in maintaining the discounts.”