(Newsday posted the following column by Ray Sanchez on its website on May 15.)
NEW YORK — Chances are nobody noticed State Supreme Court Justice Louis York on the subway last night, but millions of bus and train riders will have heard of him by the morning rush.
It took a Manhattan judge with a MetroCard to rule against the powerful Metropolitan Transportation Authority. It took this decent and unassuming man, who takes three trains from the Upper West Side to a downtown courthouse, to truly understand the plight of seven million voiceless transit riders.
It was pure chance that York, 64, was assigned a lawsuit filed by the Straphangers Campaign in April: a computer made the selection. Still, York was the right man to hear the case against a deceitful public authority with a virtual monopoly over approximately one-third of the nation’s commuters.
The 21-page decision rolling back the steepest fare increase in the city’s history was released yesterday in time for the evening rush. The authority has said that it will appeal but York’s decision reaffirmed what the public already knew: The MTA misled New Yorkers when it said that a fare increase was necessary to offset a budget deficit in 2003.
The suit was filed after reports by the city and state comptrollers found that the MTA was deceptive and secretive about its budget process. State Comptroller Alan Hevesi claimed the authority could have arranged its finances to end this fiscal year with a small surplus, instead of a deficit of more than $200 million. The public had an incomplete picture of the agency’s finances during 10 hearings the comptrollers called “shams.”
In court, of course, MTA lawyers argued that the judge had no power to rule on the matter.
“For one thing, courts must have the power to evaluate government actions when serious questions are raised as to whether the actors complied with the law,” York wrote in his decision.
Financial transparency apparently is a new concept for the MTA.
“The right to a public hearing and to public scrutiny is based on the principle of fundamental fairness which is required of all governmental agencies, officers and employees,” the judge said.
York ruled that the authority’s 10 public hearings on the fare hike were “based on the false and misleading premise that the MTA was in worse financial condition than it knew itself to be.” Notices advising the public of those hearings simply were wrong.
“The misleading information that the MTA included in the notice had a chilling effect on the public, discouraging an open and complete discussion of the proposals and foreclosing the presentation of creative alternatives in light of the actual surplus,” the decision said.
The MTA, therefore, not only lied to the public but also to its politically-connected board.
“By presenting information which misled the public and the board as to the current financial status of respondents, undermined the public’s confidence in the MTA,” York wrote.
The judge stressed that the court was not questioning the authority’s right to raise fares or enact cost-cutting measures or manage its budget.
“Respondents’ rights do not, however, include the right to misinform the public they serve,” York said. “And when they act in blatant disregard of this principle, the resulting action is invalid; and the courts … cannot allow the determination to stand.”
York gave the MTA two weeks to roll back the fares. He ordered the agency to hold a new round of hearings.
“We disagree with Judge York’s decision,” MTA spokesman Tom Kelly said last night, “and we will appeal.”
Still, if you see York on the subway this morning, thank him.