(The following article by Caren Halbfinger was published by the White Plains Journal News on June 23.)
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. — While the Metropolitan Transportation Authority lobbies quietly for its own restructuring legislation, advocates for reforming the agency have their work cut out for them this summer, keeping the issue before the public now that the state Legislature has failed to address it.
Although reform measures proposed by Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, D-Greenburgh, were approved by a wide margin in the state Assembly, where Brodsky has aggressively championed the cause, the Senate did not act. To get the changes they want, Brodsky and transit advocates will have to work to build consensus in the fall, when the Legislature could reconvene for a special session.
But Brodsky has room for leverage, because the MTA wants legislative approval of its own proposal to restructure the agency.
“It’s a real missed opportunity,” Brodsky said. “If it means I have to hold these hearings every two months, there will be oversight of the MTA. Our committee will continue with the process, and there’s plenty to talk about. Their reorganization bill will not be considered, absent strong reforms. If they want the reorganization, they better start talking real reform.”
The governor’s office did not respond to requests for comment, nor did a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, R-Rensselaer County.
Brodsky leads the Assembly’s Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions, which has held a series of hearings aimed at reforming the MTA, which has been widely criticized for its opaque budget process and has been plagued with several corruption scandals.
“I think reform is inevitable, and I’m talking about significantly more than they’re planning to do,” said Gene Russianoff, staff lawyer for the Straphangers Campaign, which has endorsed Brodsky’s legislation and is suing the MTA, claiming it misled the public before raising fares and tolls this year. “I cannot believe all they’re going to do is have a new schedule for their budget and put some stuff on the Web site. The agency’s credibility is in tatters. The only way to restore it is to have new outside monitors to give the public some assurance that the books aren’t cooked.”
It appears organized labor will help keep the issue before the public. Leadership from Transport Workers Union Local 100, which represents transit workers, along with other unions, activists and Democratic legislators, plan to hold a symposium July 28 to address the future of public transportation in New York and the future of the MTA.
Union leaders, including Roger Toussaint, president of TWU Local 100, opposed passage of the MTA’s restructuring legislation, calling for a thorough debate.
The 209-plus-page bill proposed by MTA Executive Director Katherine Lapp calls for reshaping the transit agency into five operating subsidiaries — Bridges and Tunnels; MTA Bus, which would include citywide and Long Island bus operations; MTA Capital Construction; MTA Rail and MTA Subways.
Although many of the changes can be made administratively, the agency wants to group similar functions, eliminate duplication and maximize efficiencies.The MTA’s own early estimates suggest it can save $30 million a year by combining the operations of the Metro-North and Long Island railroads, and it expects to save “tens of millions of dollars a year more” agencywide.
Lapp was sick late last week, and MTA spokesman Tom Kelly said Friday that he was not willing to comment on the issue.
“Any discussions about that are better left between the parties,” Kelly said. “It’s now a legislative issue.”
Lapp opposes several of Brodsky’s key reforms, such as creating an independent budget office; a central procurement office to oversee all contracts; having the agency’s inspector general appointed by the state attorney general instead of the governor; and establishing procedures to report all contacts between lobbyists for contractors seeking or already doing business with the MTA and MTA employees, officials and board members. The MTA’s legislation includes a less stringent way of tracking procurement lobbying.
Beyond streamlining the $7 billion transit agency’s operations, the MTA proposal also contains a bid to consolidate control over the agency’s funding streams from a variety of state taxes and bridge and tunnel tolls. How those funds are divided among subways, buses and commuter rail is now determined by formulas that were established by state law. The MTA’s legislation would change that.
“It’s kind of astonishing that despite all the criticism of the MTA, they waited until the end of the session to put out a 209-page bill to dramatically increase their powers,” Russianoff said. “The MTA bill calls for repealing all those formulas and giving sole power to divvy up the money to, you guessed it, the MTA. The bottom line for them is control over the dough.”