The MTA Fare Hike—It Isn’t Fair

Here we go again.

New York’s subway, bus, and commuter fares just went up in March. But now the Metropolitan Transportation Authority says it wants to raise the price of MetroCards and commutation tickets again in July 2009—back-to-back increases that have occurred only once before in the 104-year history of New York’s transit system.

And then there is another fare hike planned for January 2011, just 18 months later! That would be a total hike of 13 percent!

At the same time, the MTA has said it has to cut $2.7 billion from its five-year, $14.7 billion core capital program—nearly a fifth of its current efforts to bring the subways, buses and commuter lines to a state of good repair. The cuts include rehabilitating 19 fewer subway stations than before and $336 million in fans to clear smoke in emergencies.

Why so serious an assault on the riders’ pocketbooks, comfort, and safety?
Back in July, the MTA officially announced a whopping—and real, in our view—deficit for 2009. It is caused in large part by three things: declining tax revenues in a bad economy, rising fuel costs and the impact of years of massive borrowing to finance badly needed repairs.

City transit riders already pay more than their fair share. In 2006, riders of the subways and buses, Metro-North, and Long Island Rail Road paid 55, 58, and 47 percent of the operating costs for their service, respectively.

Riders in other cities pay much less, funding an average 37 percent of the costs for the 50 biggest transit systems nationwide. Riders in Philadelphia, Boston and Los Angeles pay 37, 29 and 23 percent respectively of the costs for their transit systems.

Unfortunately, these dire finances are unfolding as the price of fuel has drawn many new people to transit, with total ridership up in the last year by more than 5 percent on the subways, LIRR and Metro-North. What’s more, the proposed hikes come at a time when working and middle-class New Yorkers are already struggling with a rising cost of living and the threat of a recession.

The MTA’s problem is clear. As a recent editorial in The New York Times noted, “The city and state have unconscionably underfinanced mass transit for years, a legacy of Gov. George Pataki and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. The formula for funding mass transportation should be changed before any fares are raised.” A recent report by the New York City Independent Budget Office detailed the inequities (See http://www.ibo.nyc.ny.us/).

The nine million daily riders in downstate New York are in desperate need of the leadership of Governor David Paterson and Mayor Michael Bloomberg, as well as state and federal legislators.

Governor Paterson has appointed a panel to recommend how the MTA can get out of this mess, headed by former MTA Chairman Richard Ravitch. It is due to report a month after state legislative elections. The trick will be to win follow-up action on the part of those elected to the state legislature.

Mayor Bloomberg’s administration must also serve transit better. Right now, the city pays for only seven percent of the subway and bus system’s $6.4 billion operating budget and only four percent of the MTA’s five-year capital program for fixing the existing system. This for a system that fuels the city’s economy and mobility.
But the MTA shouldn’t receive new revenues without new safeguards. There is widespread concern among the public and their elected representatives about the MTA’s financial credibility.

This skepticism is based on widely publicized events such as accusations of misleading reporting of the MTA’s deficit in 2003, large cost overruns on its leased headquarters in lower Manhattan, and a recent proposal and withdrawal of service enhancements.

In 2003, the MTA instituted reforms in the way it informed the public about its finances. For example, it issued its preliminary budget several months in advance of its adoption to receive public comment. Unfortunately these changes have not been enough.

One possible reform would be to create an Office of Independent Public Authorities Overseers. Such an agency could serve to monitor MTA financial reporting and priorities.

The MTA could also provide the public with computer tracking of the hundreds of millions of dollars the MTA approves each year.

Another reform could be to open up preparation of the capital program. In large part, there is little outside involvement the MTA’s capital plan. The capital plan could benefit from an advisory committee composed of stakeholders to whom the MTA would have to explain its thinking in detail. This would help invest others in various communities (business, labor and civic) in winning a well-funded plan.

So, will already-beleaguered riders be abandoned to cope with these difficulties alone, with higher fares and a little hope in fixing our old system? Or will Governor Paterson, Mayor Bloomberg and our legislative leaders fight for transit? The next several months will tell.

The author is the senior attorney for the NYPIRG Straphangers Campaign against the fare hike.