Jay Walder, chairman and chief executive officer of New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority, last week urged the municipal finance community to continue to support capital funding for mass-transit projects despite the economic downturn.
Walder spoke during a Municipal Forum of New York luncheon on Thursday attended by more than 300 municipal bankers, lawyers, financial advisers, and other market participants. He encouraged the financial community to support infrastructure investment in the MTA and not let New York City’s subways, commuter railroads, and buses return to the days when officials halted capital projects due to tough economic times.
“The finance industry has been an absolutely critical partner in moving forward our capital program and we continue to look for your support and we continue to look for your voice, which I expect we will need,” Walder said. “Make yourself heard. It matters to you in your business, it matters to you in your lives. Everybody should make themselves heard.”
The MTA board on April 28 will vote on a revamped five-year, $28 billion capital program. The next stop will be Albany, where the Legislature and Gov. David Paterson will weigh in on the proposal. Paterson last year rejected a capital program he said was too costly, sending it back to the MTA for revision.
Walder said that the first two years of the proposed five-year capital program are fully funded. He believes the authority should move forward with the capital plan while keeping an eye on addressing the future funding shortfall.
“It’s not a full five-year funding envelope, but it is a five-year planning framework,” he said. “And with the benefit of some time, with the benefit of, hopefully, some recovery of some of our revenues, I think we’ll be in good shape to fill that gap.”
