ALBANY—Speaking about his compromise M.T.A. bailout plan, David Paterson said, "Right now I'm interested in anything that will clear up the immediate problem–the one that will come at the end of the month. The capital plan is not the real issue right now."
The plan would avert the worst of the immediate fare hikes and service cuts but would leave no money for the agency's five-year capital plan.
He continued: "I don't think that we can take the capital plan, the road and bridge plan, the added deficit, and resolve all those issues in time to avert a very severe fare hike and service cuts to all the people who use transit in the M.T.A. region."
In hopes of finding a temporary way to avert an M.T.A. doomsday scenario, Paterson proposed a revision of the State Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith's plan designed to make it more attractive to holdout suburban state senators by refunding money that suburban school districts will be paying toward a payroll tax. Paterson said he is ready to talk to the remaining holdout Democrats–Craig Johnson and Brian Foley, both of Long Island–about the proposal.
But transit advocates are concerned that this bailout package, which was admittedly not drafted on any merits, but rather to be politically passable, will be adequate to the task. It should raise about $1.8 billion, which Paterson was unable to say would cover any kind of payment–initial or otherwise–toward the five-year capital plan which that will be submitted and adopted this fall.
Paterson said he hopes to deal with that as soon as possible.
It's instructive to see the governor's progression from two months ago, when he held a press conference on St. Patrick's Day at his Manhattan office to pan one of Smith's earlier proposals that did not include capital financing for the authority. He reiterated his support for the Ravitch Plan, which would have provided about $600 million of revenue for capital improvements.
"There seems to be a belief that these types of issues can be deferred into some sort of future activity," the governor said at the time. "This is what has gotten Albany in trouble time and time again."
Richard Ravitch, who stood beside the governor and a group of transportation advocates, chimed in: "The idea that the legislature will do, six months from now, closer to the next election, that which they won't do now is to test the credulity of all of us who have some familiarity with what happens in Albany."
