(Newsday posted the following story by Joshua Robin on its website on May 15.)
NEW YORK — The MTA today signaled it will appeal a judge’s ruling that ordered the recent transit fare hikes to be rolled back.
Under state law, that means Justice Louis York’s decision yesterday is automatically delayed until the appeal can be heard in State Supreme Court’s Appellate Division. That is because the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is a government agency.
“We’re automatically granted a stay,” said Tom Kelly, an MTA spokesman.
Attorneys for a transit watchdog group that brought the suit were planning their next move, which lawyers said would be a motion to fight the stay.
“We’re never said it’s gonna be easy,” said Gene Russianoff, staff attorney for the Straphangers Campaign.
Lawyers for Straphangers’ Campaign, which brought the lawsuit over the fare hike, said they would seek to lift the stay.
Yesterday, state Supreme Court Justice Louis York ordered the MTA to roll back the fare increases on subways, buses and suburban trains, ruling the authority deceived riders with a phony tale of financial misery.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority was given two weeks to restore the $1.50 fare and the old commuter railroad rates, York declared. Then the authority can hold another set of public hearings on raising commuting costs, the judge said.
“The court finds that the hearings were based on the false and misleading premise that the MTA was in worse financial condition that it knew itself to be,” York decided.
“Hallelujah!” cheered Russianoff, whose group sought turnstile justice in the suit last month, charging the hearings were a sham. “This is a tremendous victory for the riding public.”
“Every now and then the good guys win,” added a relieved Eric Schneiderman, attorney for the Straphangers Campaign, a transit watchdog group that brought the suit last month.
After an emergency meeting at MTA headquarters on Madison Avenue yesterday, spokesman Tom Kelly said the authority would appeal the ruling. He declined further comment.
If the MTA’s appeal is successful, the $2 bus and subway base fare won’t change. But Schneiderman said he and state Comptroller Alan Hevesi would urge the agency to lower the fare to $1.75.
Schneiderman said the price would reflect the agency’s legitimate financial status as well as riders’ concerns about having to pay 33 percent more at the turnstile in a recession.
“The MTA’s still going to have another vote, and I don’t want them to just roll the fare back to two bucks,” Schneiderman said.Russianoff’s group brought the suit in April, after Hevesi and city Comptroller William Thompson concluded that the MTA misled riders by claiming it faced a $2.8 billion deficit in 2004 and 2004.
But Hevesi found that the MTA masked $537 million of surplus funds in what he called a second set of books.That money could have been used to delay the hike instead of defraying future deficits, Hevesi found.
But MTA officials appropriated the money to the 2003 and 2004 budgets without notifying riders or even the MTA board members considering the 50-cent hike, Hevesi found.On March 6, the board, most of them appointed by Gov. George Pataki, unanimously agreed to the hikes; they were implemented at the beginning of this month.York had no problem with MTA’s saying the decision to shift funds was within its powers.
But he criticized the agency’s contention that it wasn’t required to disclose information about how it budgeted its surplus.
“The right to a public hearing and to public scrutiny are based on the principle of fundamental fairness, which is required of all government agencies, officers and employees when dealing with the citizens of the state or their affairs,” said the judge.
While the Straphangers were celebrating the ruling, City Councilman John Liu (D-Flushing), called for MTA Chairman Peter Kalikow to resign.
The MTA’s Kelly would not comment on Liu’s statement.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who appointed two of the MTA board members, said, “I guess you can put me down as happy that I don’t have to pay more for the moment, but unfortunately I think the MTA made the case before that they are going to need the monies.”
What Pataki and the MTA will do if the board has to vote again isn’t clear.
A spokeswoman for Pataki would say only that the governor was reviewing the judge’s decision.
One Pataki appointee, James Simpson, said last night in an interview that he supports the $2 hike.He strongly took issue with York’s ruling.
“The judge is probably not an accountant or probably never ran his own business,” Simpson said. “I’m still for the fare hike.”
Told Hevesi would suggest a new $1.75 fare, Simpson replied: “Then the comptroller should be the head of the MTA.”