(Newsday posted the following article by Joie Tyrrell and Brandon Bain on its website on November 16.)
NEW YORK — A commuter tax like the one New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg wants to revive would place another unfair burden on Long Island Rail Road passengers who already pay more than their city subway counterparts, some riders and mass transit advocates said yesterday.
While the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has reduced average fares for subway riders since 1996 through discounts, average LIRR fares have become more expensive. For example, a monthly ticket from Penn Station to Hicksville cost $154 in 1996 compared to $203 today, a jump of almost 32 percent. City transit fare is $2, but through multi-ride MetroCards and other discounts, the average city transit fare has dropped from $1.38 in 1996 to $1.31 today.
And Bloomberg’s proposed plan, a charge of 0.45 percent on commuters’ wages, adds insult to injury, some said.
“I’m not happy about an additional tax. There probably are some other ways they can generate revenue to New York City,” said Arthur Arschin, 54, an attorney who lives in Jericho. “It’s easy to hit up commuters for additional fees. … You have to go to work, it’s a captive audience.
“They cut out Sunday parking, you go into the city and you don’t have to pay the meters … it’s phenomenal. It’s interesting that they’re imposing this right after they kicked out the Sunday thing.”
Bloomberg has been pushing for a commuter tax, but such a tax was eliminated in 1999 and state legislators promised to kill plans to revive it. City Hall officials say the mayor, facing a new multibillion-dollar deficit, may be staking an early posture for the Albany session that starts in six weeks and for his own talks with city council.
“There is only so much the commuters can stand,” said Gerry Bringmann, chairman of the LIRR Commuter’s Council, an advocacy group. “The commuter tax might be the straw that broke the camel’s back and makes people decide they can’t afford to work in the city anymore.”
The MTA raised LIRR commuter fares an average of 25 percent in 2003 and an average of 4 percent to 7 percent earlier this year. In February, railroad officials said ridership has dropped in the past three years.
LIRR commuter Steven Sturm, 28, an insurance broker from New Hyde Park, said, “They want people to ride public transportation to cut down on traffic and now you’re going to charge them more?
“Forget about it. I’ll start driving some more.”
While it’s difficult to draw an exact comparison on prices between subway and suburban riders, “on the LIRR, there are some incentives but they are not comparable in any way shape or form to what transit gets,” said Tom Dunham, a spokesman for state Sen. Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre). “The commuter tax was always an unfair levy and it is counter-productive at the same time.”
Unfair share?
While city subway and bus base fares have risen since 1996, the introduction of multi-ride MetroCards has dropped the average fare over the past decade. Long Island Rail Road riders, on the other hand, have seen their fares increase by about one-third over the same time period.