ALBANY—Even if it is palatable enough to pass both houses of the legislature, the plan to bail out the M.T.A. that David Paterson formally unveiled this weekend is not getting a warm welcome from the alliance of labor leaders and transit advocates that pushed firmly for the Ravitch plan. They write, with charming understatement, that the plan “may not” adequately address the system’s capital needs.
"The current worsening of the MTA's finances combined with the difficulty of passing new sources of revenue in election years, like next year, adds up to a very real threat," say Kevin Corbett and Bob Yaro, the co-chairs of the Empire State Transportation Alliance, in a letter sent to Paterson and legislative leaders Friday. "As members of the business, civic and labor community, we call on the state's leadership to act on a final package that responsibly and adequately provides a long term source of funding for the transit system's rebuilding needs. Now is the window of opportunity. The future health of the transit network and the region itself depend on the state meeting these long term needs."
The letter, below, was followed up with a statement Sunday night in which the group says that with the M.T.A.'s deficit ballooning, the plan on the table no longer provides enough revenue to cover operating and capital needs. This was the main reason cited by Paterson and others when they blasted a plan released in March by Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith.
Smith will reportedly meet with the remaining holdout senators in his conference today.
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said, "I share the Governor's urgency about the need to pass a plan to save the fare and stop massive service cuts, and the Assembly is prepared to act."
On Friday, Silver expressed some reservations about Paterson's plan.
